With the Galaxy Note 20 launch just a week away, all eyes will be on what upgrades Samsung brings to the table. While the chipset might remain unchanged, there might be a silver lining. While Samsung flagship like the Note series and the S series are powered by Snapdragon chipsets in the US and European markets, they come with Exynos chipset in Asian markets such as India. It often tends to lose out on the performance front against Qualcomm Snapdragon counterparts. However, a new leak suggests some good news in this regard. Samsung Galaxy Note 20 release date, price, news and leaks Upcoming smartphones in India: Specs, launch date, price (Image credit: Samsung/WinFuture) According to a tweet by Anthony, a Youtuber, Samsung Galaxy Note 20 will continue to be powered by the Exynos 990 chipset, but with major improvements in terms of the performance and efficiency. These optimizations should bring it closer to the Snapdragon 865 series. He even suggested that it is almost li...
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Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2: what we want to see
Update: The Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 might actually launch as the Sony Xperia XZ Pro. We've also seen renders possibly showing the phone and heard a number of rumored specs.
The Sony Xperia XZ Premium is one of the most impressive Sony flagships of recent years, thanks largely to its 4K screen and capable camera. Thing is, it’s been out a while now, so talk is inevitably turning to what's next; the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2.
Will it go above 4K? Will it launch soon? And will it have a new design? We don’t have definitive answers to any of those questions yet, but we are starting to hear rumors, which we’ve detailed below.
We’ve also come up with a list of things we hope for from the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2. You’ll find that at the bottom of this article.
Cut to the chase What is it? The next 4K flagship from SonyWhen is it out? Possibly early 2018What will it cost? A lot Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 release date and priceThe Sony Xperia XZ Premium was announced at MWC 2017, so there’s a fair chance we’ll see the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 at MWC 2018, which takes place from February 26 to March 1 2018.
However, the XZ Premium didn’t actually go on sale until June 2017, so even if the XZ Premium 2 is announced in February or March you might not be able to buy it until later in 2018.
Further confusing matters is the fact that there was well over a year between the Sony Xperia Z5 Premium and the Sony Xperia XZ Premium, so it’s possible that we won’t see the XZ Premium 2 for a while yet.
Whenever it does launch it’s sure to cost a lot. The Sony Xperia XZ Premium started at $799/£649 (about AU$1,100) SIM-free, and with flagship prices rising the Xperia XZ Premium 2 is likely to cost more if anything.
Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 news and rumorsThere’s only been a few Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 leaks so far, but they've revealed a lot. For one thing we've seen renders possibly showing the phone.
The images show two handsets, one of which - the one said to be the XZ Premium 2 - has a large edge-to-edge screen and a mirror-like back.
Apparently this phone would have a fingerprint scanner built into the screen, plus a Snapdragon 845 chipset, 6GB of RAM, a dual-lens rear camera, 128GB of storage and front-facing stereo speakers.
Those specs match another recent leak, which adds that the phone will have a microSD card slot (with a 256GB capacity), a 3,420mAh battery, IP68 water and dust resistance and run Android Oreo - but that it might have a new name, possibly being dubbed the Sony Xperia XZ Pro.
In older news, a screenshot of a specs list for a Sony phone with the model number H8541 was posted to Reddit and includes a 5.7-inch 4K display with support for HDR.
If accurate that would make it slightly bigger than the 5.46-inch screen of the Xperia XZ Premium, but that’s in line with the rising size of flagships.
Interestingly though the list also mentions dimensions of 149 x 74 x 7.5mm, which would actually make it smaller than the 156 x 77 x 7.9mm Xperia XZ Premium.
To have achieved a smaller size with a bigger screen suggests major changes to the design and likely much smaller bezels, which the images above match up with.
A possible specs list for the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2. Credit: Reddit
But that’s not too much of a surprise, as a Sony executive had previously said that the company was working on a range of phones with a completely new design.
Another highlight of the specs list is mention of a 3,420mAh battery, as that’s bigger than the 3,230mAh battery in the original XZ Premium (a phone which already has reasonable life).
However, the rest of the specs are less promising, with a Snapdragon 835 chipset, 4GB of RAM, Android Oreo and IP68-certified dust and water resistance all mentioned, which are the same assortment of specs as its predecessor.
They’re high-end specs, but by 2018 they won’t be top-end anymore. Of course, it’s entirely possible that this spec list is fake or wrong, especially as some of those specs are different to what we've heard more recently.
What we want to seeThe Sony Xperia XZ Premium got 4.5 stars in our review, but the Xperia XZ Premium 2 will have to build on it in significant ways if it wants to impress us. Here are seven things that would help.
1. A new design
Sony's phones have mostly looked like this for years, so it's time for a change
Calling the design of Sony’s Xperia range tired would seem almost generous at this point. Although the materials vary, Sony hasn’t significantly changed the look of its handsets in years, and those big screen bezels are seriously dated in the face of all-screen phones like the iPhone X and Samsung Galaxy Note 8.
So we really want to see a new design for the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2, and fortunately it looks likely that we will, since not only has a Sony executive claimed some upcoming phones will have a new design, but a spec sheet lists dimensions which suggest one.
2. A bigger screenAt 5.46 inches the screen on the Sony Xperia XZ Premium isn’t exactly small, but to truly make the most of that 4K resolution it really needs to be bigger, and with rivals like the Samsung Galaxy S8 pushing screen sizes ever higher it would also help the XZ Premium 2 to compete.
It doesn’t need to be enormous, but a move to around 5.8 inches could make all the difference, especially if Sony also shrinks the bezels to keep the overall handset size roughly the same.
3. Fingerprint scanning in the US
The power button of many Sony phones houses a fingerprint scanner, but not in the US
In most of the world Sony flagships have fingerprint scanners, as you’d expect, since that’s a standard feature of high-end phones, but in the US they don’t.
It’s a major omission, and while there’s presumably a reason for it the lack of a scanner could make Sony phones less appealing than biometrically secured rivals.
So we hope the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 will have a fingerprint scanner in all regions, or if that’s not an option then how about a high-tech face scanner like the one on the iPhone X?
4. Less bloatThe Sony Xperia XZ Premium is weighed down with a lot of pre-installed apps, many of which duplicate the functions of Google’s suite of apps (which is also present) or just aren’t very useful.
For the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 we want less bloat, with a clean version of Android. Given that a whole store of apps is only a tap away it’s easy enough to fill in any gaps, so just give us the basics, with no duplicates.
5. A dual-lens camera
The XZ Premium has a good camera, but an extra lens could make it even better
Sony’s flagship phones tend to have quite good cameras and the Xperia XZ Premium is no exception. In our review we praised its impressive slow-motion camera and its ability to capture a lot of detail, but it’s just a single lens snapper and with many rivals moving to dual-lens ones we want to see Sony follow suit.
Dual-lens is more than just a marketing gimmick, as it can unlock new features such as lossless optical zoom, so it could benefit the Xperia XZ Premium 2.
6. More powerThe Xperia XZ Premium has a decent amount of power, but early rumors suggest the new model won’t get a chipset or RAM boost, which would be disappointing, not just because it’s reasonable to expect more power from a new model, but because by the time it lands those specs will be looking slightly dated for a high-end phone.
So hopefully that rumor is wrong and the Xperia XZ Premium 2 actually will get a performance upgrade. We’d like to see it pack the upcoming Snapdragon 845 chipset. RAM can stay at 4GB, but we wouldn’t say no to more.
7. A slicker SIM slotIt’s a minor point but in our review of the Xperia XZ Premium we found its SIM card slot to be both fiddly and flimsy, so we’d like to see it reworked for the Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2.
It’s not something most people should have to interact with often, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be decent quality.
Don't need 4K? The Sony Xperia XZ2 is probably on the way too.
Update: Xbox Live Gold deal gets you six months for half price
Update: It looks like Microsoft has stopped running the discount now, which is a shame as the promotional text yesterday said the sale was on for another 20 days. Fear not though, we've found a deal that's almost as good and still offers the best price around for six months of Xbox Live Gold membership. Check it out:
Original story follows...
Looking to get a great new Xbox Live Gold deal for the cheapest price of the year so far? Actually, this is equivalent to an ace deal we saw around Black Friday, so don't expect to find a sub this cheap again for a while.
We've looked through all the best Xbox Live Gold membership deals around and we're convinced this is the best around right now for UK Xbox fans, especially at this time of year. Don't forget, you can stack subs, so you don't even have to keep the code safe until you want to activate it, just get it done as soon as possible.
Why do I need an Xbox Live Gold subscription?As with past consoles in the Xbox lineup, the Xbox One or Xbox One X also require an Xbox Live Gold subscription in order to play games online. You also get a selection of free games as a part of your membership and there are Xbox One Gold member-exclusive discounts in the many sales on the Xbox Live store.
MWC 2018: what we want to see
Update: The Samsung Galaxy S9 and Huawei P11 are both looking very likely to land at MWC, plus there's new info on most of the phones we might see there.
MWC (or Mobile World Congress to give it its full name) is one of the biggest events on the mobile calendar, with 2017’s Barcelona show bringing us the LG G6, Sony Xperia XZ Premium and Huawei P10 among dozens of other devices.
With the next show starting on February 26 we’re only weeks away, and rumors about the phones we'll likely see are pouring in. You'll find all the latest news below, along with a wish list of what we want to see.
So have a read, see if you agree, and let us know in the comments if there’s anything else you’re really hoping for at MWC 2018.
Cut to the chase What is it? The biggest phone show of 2018When is it? It all kicks off on February 26, 2018 MWC 2018 newsThere's not much MWC 2018 news yet, but Samsung has confirmed that it will launch the Samsung Galaxy S9 and Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus at a tradeshow in February, which all but guarantees an MWC launch, since there aren't any other big mobile trade shows in February.
The Galaxy S9 and its larger sibling are rumored to have a similar design and screen to the Galaxy S8 range, meaning a metal frame, a glass back and an almost bezel-free curved display, but with more power, an improved iris scanner and a potentially far upgraded camera, with two lenses in the case of the S9 Plus and a variable aperture in the case of the S9.
The Huawei P11 - or Huawei P20 as it might be called - will also probably land at MWC 2018, as a Huawei exec has said that the company will "probably launch devices at Mobile World Congress" in the future.
The Huawei P11 is rumored to have a bezel-free screen, a system like Apple's Face ID and a rear camera that could be as much as 40MP, among other things.
Sony could have a premium new handset headed for MWC 2018
With the LG G6 and Sony Xperia XZ Premium announced at MWC 2017 there's a good chance we'll also see the LG G7 and Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 at MWC 2018, as well as numerous other phones and probably some tablets and wearables too, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab S4.
Rumored highlights of the LG G7 include a Snapdragon 845 chipset and an OLED screen, though one source reckons it won't be announced until March, so it might be an MWC no-show.
The Xperia XZ Premium 2 meanwhile could have a 5.7-inch 4K screen squeezed into a compact body, suggesting a new design for the phone.
While the above handsets are all likely candidates for an MWC announcement, we wouldn't count on seeing new phones from HTC at MWC 2018, as the company only recently launched the HTC U11 Plus, and it didn't unveil a flagship at MWC 2017.
The dates of the event have been confirmed too, with MWC 2018 taking place between February 26 and March 1 2018 in Barcelona. We'll be reporting live from the show to bring you all the latest phone launches.
What we want to seeWith nothing yet announced for MWC 2018 we’re free to dream of all the things we might see, or at least hope to see. The following are among our most wanted.
1. Samsung Galaxy S9Samsung didn’t entirely skip MWC 2017, in fact it even held a press conference, but instead of the Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus (which arrived later) we got the Samsung Galaxy Tab S3.
Samsung's Galaxy S8 skipped MWC 2017.
It’s understandable that Samsung would want a separate event away from the madness of MWC to launch its biggest phone, but then the S8 is big enough that it would easily be the most popular launch of the show, so a separate announcement isn’t really needed.
We hope Samsung will make MWC 2018 one to remember by using it to launch the Samsung Galaxy S9.
2. A folding phoneIt’s felt like folding phones have been just over the horizon for years now, but there’s growing evidence that 2018 could be when we’ll finally see one, and MWC 2018 would be the ideal place for it to launch.
Hopefully when it does launch it will be more than just a gimmick, and won’t cost so much we need to sell our kidneys to buy it.
3. A smartwatch renaissanceMWC 2017 gave us the Huawei Watch 2 and Huawei Watch 2 Classic, but not much else in the way of wearables, despite the fact that Android Wear 2.0 launched shortly before the show.
We were hoping that the first major Android Wear update would be accompanied by a shower of new smartwatches, but it wasn’t to be.
More began to land over the course of 2017, but only from a few manufacturers, so hopefully MWC 2018 will be used as an opportunity for companies to get back into the Android Wear game in big numbers.
But we don’t just want new watches, they also need to do genuinely new things and improve on the existing models to make them more desirable.
Better battery life tops our list of wants from them, since a watch we need to charge every day is not the future we envisioned.
4. More from NokiaThe big success story from MWC 2017 wasn't a flagship smartphone that costs hundreds - it was the reboot of the iconic Nokia 3310.
Launched to whip up interest in the Nokia brand again, the new 3310 was used to draw attention to the return of the famous name to the mobile market. It arrived alongside a trio of Android phones, but we're hungry for more.
We'd love to see HMD Global (the firm that's licencing the Nokia name) produce a Samsung and Apple-rivaling handset at MWC 2018. We've since had the Nokia 8 and that didn't quite cut it, but perhaps the Nokia 9 will land at MWC?
5. A real iPad rivalThere hasn’t been much of interest in the world of Android tablets lately, other than the Samsung Galaxy Tab S3, which itself was announced at MWC 2017.
At 2018’s show we’d like to see a larger number of slates, and for at least some of them to genuinely match up to the iPad Pro 2 duo.
6. InnovationMWC 2017 saw the launch of numerous bigger and better phones across the low, mid and high-end, but the improvements were usually the expected ones – sharper screens, faster chipsets and so on.
Innovation wasn’t absent, but it was in short supply, so while we certainly wouldn’t say no to all the usual improvements next year, we hope they’re accompanied by more truly new, different and interesting things.
7. Big phones from small companiesWhile smaller companies weren’t absent from MWC 2017, they generally failed to grab much attention, and that’s not just because they’re not household names, but also because – in many cases at least - their announcements were genuinely less interesting.
We’d like to see more lesser known brands grab headlines with exciting announcements at MWC 2018.
That might be tough for small companies, but there’s potential for huge – but little known in the west – companies like Xiaomi to do it.
8. The next generation of fitness trackersAs well as an absence of smartwatches there wasn’t much for fitness fans to see at MWC 2017 either, so we’d like to see an influx of sporty wearables at MWC 2018.
And as with smartwatches these need to be significant improvements on what’s gone before – perhaps somehow automatically tracking a wider range of workouts than most of the current selection, like weights and yoga.
MWC's announcements are sure to shake up our list of the best phones
Nintendo to announce a 'new interactive experience' for the Switch today
After last week’s surprise Direct, we weren’t expecting any big Nintendo Switch announcements for a while. However, 2018 appears to be the year Nintendo is aiming to defy expectations. Somewhat out of the blue the company has announced that it will reveal a “new interactive experience” for the Nintendo Switch at 10pm GMT on January 17.
Details on what this experience will actually involve are non-existent right now but according to Nintendo it’s been “specially crafted for kids and those who are kids at heart.”
Making moves to draw in a young and fresh audience is an unsurprising move from Nintendo. Just recently Nintendo's president Tatsumi Kimishima said that the console’s second year would be “crucial” in determining its longevity. A big part of the company’s second years plans, he revealed, involved expanding the console’s playerbase “beyond traditional gamers" and include those “who barely touch game consoles”.
Expanding the playerbaseThis reveal certainly seems like it could be a big part of those plans. Promises of “a new interactive experience” suggests this will be more than a software announcement, and many are wondering if the console could be about to receive a new accessory.
A virtual reality headset was our immediate thought, and we know it’s something that Nintendo has been looking into given past patent applications. However, recent comments from the Nintendo France General Manager Philippe Lavoué suggest that Nintendo is no longer actively interested in the technology.
“If you look at VR headsets, I doubt they can appeal to the mainstream,” Lavoué said in an interview with Les Numeriques. “Consumers are not patient with entertainment if you’re not able to deliver an all-inclusive package.”
Given the doubt around VR, we're also wondering whether we could finally see one of Nintendo's mobile offerings link up with its new console.
The recent release of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp left many wondering whether the beloved franchise would eventually make its debut on the Switch and this could be a good opportunity for Nintendo to bring mobile and console closer together.
One of Animal Crossing's designers, Aya Kyogoku, drew attention to the upcoming announcement on Twitter which adds weight to our suspicions that the experience will be related to Animal Crossing in some way.
As torturous as the wait will be, it’s not long until Nintendo reveals all at 10pm GMT/ 2pm PT. Keep an eye on TechRadar where we’ll be reporting all the information as it’s announced.
These are the best Nintendo Switch games you can play right now
The Surface Book 2 is finally in India
Microsoft today announced that from February continuing through to April, both the Surface Book 2 13.5-inch and 15-inch flavours will be rolling out to India, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates, as well as the following countries: Bahrain, China, Hong Kong, Italy, Korea, Kuwait, Malaysia, Oman, Portugal, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Taiwan, and Thailand.
The hybrid hasn’t previously been on sale in these territories, and pricing is still to be confirmed.
The 15-inch model features an 8th-gen Core i7 processor alongside a more powerful GPU than you’ll get in the 13.5-inch Surface Book 2 – it runs with a GeForce GTX 1060 with 6GB of video memory (as opposed to a GTX 1050 with 2GB of video RAM).
Previously, the bigger and beefier 15-inch convertible had only been launched in the US, but pre-orders are about to go live in the UK and Australia, as well as in Canada and Ireland, alongside the following nations: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland.
So there’s more pixel-shifting power here, which is just as well as the display of the 15-inch version has a resolution of 3,240 x 2,160 compared to the smaller Surface Book 2's 3,000 x 2,000 (but because it’s a bigger screen, it actually has a slightly lower pixel density – although this is a very minor difference and nothing you’d actually notice).
Those who want to partake in a spot of gaming on the move will also appreciate that the 15-inch Surface Book sequel has built-in wireless connectivity for an Xbox One controller.
Another benefit of the bigger Surface Book 2 is a beefier battery, with our testing showing that the 15-inch machine lasts for 7 hours and 40 minutes in PCMark 8 Home’s battery benchmark, with the 13.5-inch model running for just shy of 6 hours (still very respectable).
Microsoft Surface Book 2 (15-inch) review
Has the bubble burst? Bitcoin now worth ‘only’ $10,000
Has the Bitcoin bubble burst? That’s the question a lot of people have been asking recently, and with renewed vigor today, given that the virtual currency has taken a massive tumble – indeed, it has just dipped below the $10,000 (£7,250) mark, almost half of the peak it reached last month.
Around mid-December, Bitcoin hit highs of around $19,500 (£14,130), but as Neowin reports, it has just briefly dipped below $10,000, before recovering slightly to stand a little under $10,300 at the time of writing.
The cryptocurrency has seen a meteoric rise lately, and only last October, it was worth around $6,000 (£4,350). Go back to September 2017, and it was ‘only’ worth just over $4,000 (£2,900).
So given that it increased almost fivefold in terms of value in around two and a half months through to mid-December, it’s hardly surprising that we’re seeing some major volatility on the down-slope.
Spooky storiesAs for reasons behind the big drop, investors in the virtual currency have been spooked by stories emanating from Asia, including rumors that South Korea might ban the trading of cryptocurrency – although this won’t happen, the country has since clarified, at least not in the near future – and that China could also look towards a ban.
And of course the fall in value itself has provoked sell-offs as folks get more nervous watching the Bitcoin diminish.
Bitcoin isn’t the only cryptocurrency to be getting hammered – this is happening across the board, or at least with most of the popular virtual currencies. For example, Ethereum has also dropped to around the $900 (£650) mark, when at the weekend it stood at well over $1,400 (£1,000).
We’ve picked out the best mining GPU of 2018
Robot Cache is a Steam competitor that will allow you to sell your old games
Look out Steam, there’s a new digital storefront coming to town. Called Robot Cache, the service states that its users will be able to purchase games just like on any other digital store. But it sets itself apart by stating that they’ll also be able to sell these games on when they’re finished with them.
This is apparently all down to the use of blockchain technology. By using it, Robot Cache will be a decentralised service with significantly lower operating costs and reduced fees for developers and publishers.
Founded by InXile Entertainment CEO Brian Fargo, Robot Cache will allow publishers and developers to keep up to 95% of their sales, which is a good chunk more than Steam and GOG, both of which currently take a 30% cut.
Resale revolutionThat’s pretty good for those selling their games on the service, but what about customers? Well, they get the benefit of being able to sell on any games they’ve purchased from the store when they’re finished with them.
There is a caveat - any payment received for re-sold games will come in the form of Robot Cache’s own new cryptocurrency called Iron. Iron can then be exchanged for cash or used to purchase new games on the site. Robot Cache states that it’ll also be possible to earn Iron though mining as well as selling old games.
Though the use of blockchain and cryptocurrency could seem like an attempt to seize on the big buzzwords of the moment, they are essential for creating a trustworthy resale economy. It’s the security and record-keeping of blockchain that makes it possible for Robot Cache to ensure no unauthorised duplicates of games are being sold.
Coming soonTo put developer minds even more at ease, Robot Cache will also allow them to set the resale prices for games and take 70% of the resale proceeds. 25% will go to the player.
When it launched in the second quarter of this year, Robot Cache says it will be a “full-featured and live platform” offering “the latest and greatest video games.”
Robot Cache is certainly a unique and ambitious proposal and it knows it - the official site mentions disruption a disruptive number of times. Whether or not it will be able to compete with heavyweight services like Steam or GOG, however, is hard to determine.
There are certainly benefits to blockchain for developers, publishers and players alike but embracing a technology that many are still struggling to grasp is a risky move. There’s also the matter of how the store will look and how featured games will be curated to take into account.
We’ll have to wait until Robot Cache launches later this year to get a better idea of how it will work. In the meantime, it’s possible to visit the official Robot Cache site to find out more about its cryptocurrency and plans surrounding it.
These are the best cryptocurrency wallets in 2018
The 15-inch Surface Book 2 is now available to order in UK and Australia
The larger and more powerful 15-inch version of Microsoft’s Surface Book 2 will be available to pre-order in the UK and Australia today, along with 15 other countries – and a further 17 markets will see the release of both sizes of the 2-in-1 for the first time.
Previously, the bigger and beefier 15-inch convertible had only been launched in the US, but pre-orders are about to go live in the UK and Australia, as well as in Canada and Ireland, alongside the following nations: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland.
The 15-inch model features an 8th-gen Core i7 processor alongside a more powerful GPU than you’ll get in the 13.5-inch Surface Book 2 – it runs with a GeForce GTX 1060 with 6GB of video memory (as opposed to a GTX 1050 with 2GB of video RAM).
So there’s more pixel-shifting power here, which is just as well as the display of the 15-inch version has a resolution of 3,240 x 2,160 compared to the smaller Surface Book 2's 3,000 x 2,000 (but because it’s a bigger screen, it actually has a slightly lower pixel density – although this is a very minor difference and nothing you’d actually notice).
Those who want to partake in a spot of gaming on the move will also appreciate that the 15-inch Surface Book sequel has built-in wireless connectivity for an Xbox One controller.
Another benefit of the bigger Surface Book 2 is a beefier battery, with our testing showing that the 15-inch machine lasts for 7 hours and 40 minutes in PCMark 8 Home’s battery benchmark, with the 13.5-inch model running for just shy of 6 hours (still very respectable).
Pricey propositionThe larger convertible will start at £2,349 (around AU$4,060) for the base machine with 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, rising to £2,749 (AU$4,750) if you want 512GB of storage, and £3,149 (AU$5,440) for the 1TB model.
You do pay for that power, then, given that the 13.5-inch variant starts at £1,499 (AU$2,590).
Microsoft also announced that from February continuing through to April, both the Surface Book 2 13.5-inch and 15-inch flavours will be rolling out to India, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates, as well as the following countries: Bahrain, China, Hong Kong, Italy, Korea, Kuwait, Malaysia, Oman, Portugal, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Taiwan, and Thailand.
The hybrid hasn’t previously been on sale in these territories, and pricing is still to be confirmed.
One of Microsoft’s Surface hybrids makes our best laptops list
Best iPad apps 2018: download these now
It's the apps that really set iOS apart from other platforms - there are higher quality apps available on the App Store for the iPad than any other tablet. So which ones are worth your cash? And which are the best free apps?
Luckily for you we've tested thousands of the best iPad apps so that you don't have to. So read on for our selection of the best iPad apps - the definitive list of what applications you need to download for your iPad now.
Haven't bought an iPad yet and not sure which is best? We've got them listed on our best iPad ranking - or you can check out the best tablets list to see the full range available now.If you are looking for games, then head over to Best iPad games - where we showcase the greatest games around for your iOS device. Or if you're using an iPhone X or iPhone 8 head over to our best iPhone apps list. And if you're a professional, you may want to head straight to our top business apps.
New: Yoink ($2.99/£2.99/AU$4.49)
Yoink is a superb iPad shelf app, providing a place to temporarily store and collate files and content. It supports pretty much anything you can drag and drop on iPad – images; text; URLs; documents – and works in Split View and Slide Over (the latter feeling like Yoink’s most natural set-up). Handily, you can directly import items, too, or send content to Yoink via share sheets.
Yoink excels in the details. When items are dragged off of Yoink, they’re copied or removed, depending on the status of a padlock icon. Groups of items can be collated into stacks, and moved as one.
And because Yoink exists as a Location in the Files app, you can explore and interact with anything you’ve saved to the app without opening Yoink itself.
Can't figure out which iPad to buy? Watch our guide video below!
MindNode 5 is a mind-mapping app. That might sound dull, given that such tools are associated with boring business meetings that involve massive whiteboards... and the hope the ground will swallow you up.
But MindNode 5 is different. It’s sleek and fun to use as you smash out ideas. You can start with a Quick Entry list, which the app then turns into a mind map; or you can manually create and position nodes. For more context, it’s possible to add photos, stickers, and notes to your maps. And for when you do have to get properly businesslike, there’s a vertical layout for organizational charts.
Whatever you’re working on, MindNode 5 is far better than paper equivalents – it’s flexible, sharable, and always comprehensible.
Human Anatomy Atlas 2018 represents a leap forward for iPad education apps and digital textbooks alike. In short, it turns your iPad into an anatomy lab – and augmented reality extends this to nearby flat surfaces.
You can explore your virtual cadaver by region or system. Additionally, you can examine cross-sections, micro-anatomy (eyes; bone layers; touch receptors, and so on), and muscle actions. If you want to learn what makes you tick, it’s fascinating to spin a virtual body beneath your finger, and ‘dissect’ it by removing sections.
But the AR element is a real prize, giving you a captivating, slightly unnerving virtual body to explore. Ideal fodder for medical students, then, but great even for the simply curious. And although it’s pricey for the latter audience, the app’s often on sale, most recently dropping as low as $0.99/£0.99/AU$1.49. Snap it up if you see it cheap.
Zipped largely fixes a major shortcoming of the iOS Files app for iPad – its inability to deal with ZIP archives. The default Files app merely lets you peek inside a ZIP and extract items one at a time, but Zipped is far more capable.
If you need to unpack an archive, that can be done with a couple of taps. The files within are then saved to a user-defined location – either as they are, or within a named folder.
Creating archives is simple, too, and works via drag and drop in Split View or – an often better option – Slide Over. The one snag is Zipped only recognizes specific file formats, although the most common are covered.
Still, the low price makes it worth grabbing even if you only use it to quickly get at files within ZIPs, rather than laboriously extracting them one by one.
Clip Studio Paint Ex for manga brings the popular PC desktop app for digital artists to the iPad. And we mean that almost literally – Clip Studio looks pretty much identical to the desktop release.
In one sense, this isn’t great news – menus, for example, are fiddly to access, but it does mean you get a feature-rich, powerful app. There are loads of brushes and tools, vector capabilities, effect lines and tones for comic art, and onion skinning for animations. It also takes full advantage of Pencil, so pro artists can be freed from the desktop, and work wherever they like.
The app could do with better export and desktop workflow integration, and even some fans might be irked by the subscription model. But Clip Studio’s features and quality mean most will muddle through the former issues and pay for the latter.
Zen Studio is a unique, beautifully conceived painting and coloring app. Instead of giving you a blank canvas for free-form scribbling, Zen Studio opts for a triangular grid. Tap spaces and they fill with your selected color as a note plays. This combination of coloring and ad-hoc melody proves very relaxing – for children and adults alike.
In its free version, this is an entertaining app, but it’s worth grabbing the main $2.99/£2.99/AU$4.99 IAP. This lets you save unlimited drawings (rather than just eight), and unlocks white paint, which acts as an eraser on compositions with white backgrounds.
It also provides access to a slew of tutorials. These have you build up a picture by coloring inside stencils, which even a two-year-old should be able to cope with – and then subsequently scrawl over when the stencils disappear.
Percolator is a photo filter app for ‘brewing’ circular mosaics using a custom recipe. The coffee theme is fanciful, but it is admittedly lovely to see your photo explode into a bunch of bubbles that disappear and then reform when major changes are made to the ‘grind’ (circle size and effect) settings.
Mostly, though, we were impressed by Percolator because its effects range from the bizarre to the beautiful. Some have a kind of classical feel, a few look like high-end art posters, and with careful tweaking of ‘brew’ (pattern and blend) and ‘serve’ (effect and texture) settings, you can even approximate painterly effects.
It’s a pity you can’t save your own custom presets, although the app does at least offer some examples to get you started. For the most part, though, Percolator’s a tasty treat.
Dropped is an app designed to take advantage of the drag and drop feature that made its debut in iOS 11. It’s designed as a temporary resting point – commonly referred to in computing terminology as a ‘shelf’ – for various kinds of data, including URLs, photos, videos, text, emails, notes, and PDFs.
The idea is you can dump a bunch of things on Dropped, and figure out what you want to do with them later. Helpfully, the app automatically organizes items into categories (media; text; URLs; files), although you can also scroll through your entire list in the Recents tab.
Search and rename functionality would be helpful, but otherwise Dropped is a very useful app to have if you’re often moving content around on your iPad. It’s usable, straightforward, and works especially well as a Slide Over app.
Prompts is a writing tool designed for anyone having a hard time getting started. Create a new document and the app draws from over 300,000 unique starting lines and prompts. If you’re not keen on what it provides, tap refresh until you get something suitably inspirational.
As you’re typing away, the app then leaves you alone, but you can at any point tap the prompts icon to get a further helping hand. Often, the suggestions are rather obvious, but that doesn’t mean they’re not helpful.
The app also includes a tracking and statistics system, to try and get you writing regularly. On that basis, it’s a useful training aid to keep your writing ‘muscles’ fit and healthy, even if you naturally gravitate towards Scrivener and iA Writer when it’s time to get down to serious writing.
Little Digits is a new spin on finger counting, making use of the iPad’s large screen, and its ability to recognize loads of fingers pressing down at once.
The app’s most basic mode responds to how many fingers are touching the screen. Use a single digit, and the app chirps ONE! while a grinning one-shaped monster jigs about. Add another finger and the one is replaced by a furry two. You get the idea.
Beyond this, the app offers some basic training in number ordering, addition and subtraction, making it a great learning tool for young children.
But the smartest feature may well be multiple language support and recording. This means you can use the app to learn to count in anything from French to Swedish, and record custom prompts if your own language isn’t supported.
Kaleidoscope is a resolutely production-focused app, designed to take advantage of new functionality found in iOS 11 on modern iPads.
The app’s used to quickly compare the contents of files, images, and folders. It makes great use of drag and drop from Apple’s Files app, and uses colored overlays to clearly outline the differences between two text documents or whatever’s lurking inside a pair of folders.
When comparing images, there are various views (such as a basic A/B switch), but Kaleidoscope’s interpretation of a wipe slider is awkward, having two handles that must be separately positioned. And even with text, there’s one shortcoming, in the iOS app lacking the ‘text merge’ capabilities of its macOS cousin.
Still, if you routinely find yourself juggling folders or text documents, Kaleidoscope may prove an essential part of your iOS toolkit.
SoundForest is a creative sound toy that mashes up minimalist animal stickers and song-making.
Across four environments, you drag stickers from a strip at the bottom of the screen onto your canvas. Each one – be it animal, plant, or landmark – makes a sound that rarely recalls reality. A mandrill, for example, blasts forth a raucous slap bass. It’s colorful, entertaining, and encourages discovery and experimentation.
Once you’ve dotted your stickers about, you can fire up your composition. The sun or moon acts as a playback head, and your stickers animate as your oddball musical masterpiece blasts forth.
Pros may be frustrated by the app’s lack of export functionality, but really SoundForest is more for the masses than them – an approachable, fun way to make a noisy music loop, using a vibrant, unique interface.
Toca Life: Farm is an ambitious and rich exploratory title for kids, inviting them to manage a farm and fashion their own stories.
There are four locations: barn, house, field, and store. Each of them is packed full of elements to interact with. For youngsters, there’s plenty of fun to be had just poking around, making noises, and dragging colorful characters about.
Toca Life: Farm encourages older kids to think a little more. They can grow their own ingredients, which can subsequently be made into food. Animals can be fed and cared for, whereupon it’s possible to reap the rewards of eggs from chickens and milk from cows.
There’s no stress - this title is all about moving at your own pace. Importantly, it also eschews advertising and IAP, ensuring your little farmer can’t accidentally spend real-world cash on virtual hay bales.
Procreate is a powerful, feature-rich digital painting and sketching tool. You immediately get a taste for what’s possible by exploring the example art; and the more you poke around, the more you realize the potential on offer.
Procreate isn’t aimed solely at pros, though. Sure, they’ll love its advanced features – a perspective grid; custom brushes; layer masking; curves. The interface, though, is approachable enough for anyone. The thin strip across the top enables fast access to tool and brush menus; at the side is a bar for quickly adjusting your brush’s size and opacity.
The brush selection is immense, whether you’re into abstract doodling with strange textures, digital takes on traditional media, or something fantastical by way of brushes that paint with ‘light’ atop your creation.
In short: just buy this app, because it’s terrific.
Chambers Thesaurus is a thesaurus for your iPad. You might argue that doesn’t sound like the most exciting app in the world – and you’d be right. But if you do any writing on your iPad, it’s pretty much essential.
On macOS, Apple bundles a thesaurus with its Dictionary app, but this is absent on iOS, which merely attempts to correct spellings. Chambers’ offering therefore fills a void – and it does so in a straightforward, unassuming, highly usable manner.
Entries are clearly laid out, and you get a handy search sidebar in landscape. Pages can be bookmarked, and shared, or sent to equally impressive sister app Chambers Dictionary. If you fancy both, grab the bundle to save a few bucks.
Tayasui Memopad is a drawing tool for iPad that places an emphasis on speed. Its no-nonsense approach gives you a blank canvas on which to scribble, and a small but pleasingly diverse set of tools.
You get the usual brushes and pencils, but also more imaginative fare: blocky ‘pixel’ fingerprinting, and a slightly splodgy India ink pen – the latter being part of the one-off IAP pack. There are no layers or objects – everything you add is burned into the page (although you of course get an undo).
But it’s with image management that Tayasui Memopad really shows its stuff: your images are automatically sent to Photos, and your current canvas is copied to the clipboard when you exit the app, ready for pasting elsewhere.
As a drawing app, you might argue Tayasui Memopad is ultimately quite ordinary – if usable; but as a drawing app designed for efficiency, it excels where it counts.
MaxCurve is a professional-quality photo editor, designed for people who want plenty of control over the images they’re working on. Much of the app is based around curves you typically find in high-end editors such as Photoshop.
Adjusting curves is pleasingly tactile, enabling you to make dramatic or subtle adjustments to colors and exposure settings with ease. It makes many of MaxCurve’s iPad contemporaries seem comparatively crude. Smartly, edits are stored as virtual layers, which can be toggled, and there are also tools for cropping and vignettes.
The app feels at home on iPad, which provides enough space to see your photo and tools, without the latter obscuring the former. MaxCurve could probably do with some quick-fix solutions for things like exposure, but then perhaps that’s missing the point of an app more about careful, considered edits rather than speed.
The Brainstormer is designed to spark ideas when you’re working on a story. In its default state, it’s something of a visual oddity, with three wheels that you spin for a random set-up of plot/conflict, theme/setting, and subject/location. Individual wheels can be locked, and you can swap the wheels for a ‘slot machine’ interface if you prefer.
Although that might seem a bit gimmicky, The Brainstormer can be genuinely useful if you need a little nudge to get going. Also, the app is extensible, vastly broadening its scope. You can buy additional wheels via IAP, such as creature and world builders.
You can also directly edit existing wheels, or create your own from scratch. When you’re fresh out of ideas, a couple of bucks for endless new ones could be a bargain buy that sends you on your way to a best-seller.
Textastic is a text editor geared towards markup and coding. It’s an app that takes a no-nonsense approach – very evident the second you sit before its tasteful, minimal interface.
But that doesn’t mean the app’s heavily stripped back. As you work with Textastic, you realize it’s been cleverly optimized to speed your work along. The custom keyboard row is superb, providing fast access to a slew of handy characters.
Not keen on the way code is presented? Quickly flip to the settings, and tweak the fonts or choose an entirely new theme.
As ever, there are limitations to an iPad editor of this kind, most notably local previews when coding web pages. On that basis, you’re probably not going to create a site from scratch with Textastic.
But with its smart editor, useful settings, Split View support, and a built-in file-transfer system, it’s ideal for making quick changes or typing up Markdown notes when on the move – or on the sofa.
Thinkrolls Kings & Queens is a set of logic and physics tests for children disguised as a game.
Like other Thinkrolls titles, it involves rotund protagonists working their way to the bottom of a series of blocky towers. Their way is regularly barred by various elements that must be successfully manipulated to fashion a way onward.
For example, gears and racks might need combining to create a conveyor belt, or a mirror shifted to reflect light and remove a ghost.
It’s all clever stuff, and also broadly stress-free. There are no time limits at all, and multiple profiles can be set up to cater for several kids on a single device.
And although Kings & Queens is intended for kids between five and eight years old, the interface and design is such that younger children should be able to delve into the adventure, too – albeit perhaps with supervision to initially help them understand the trickier challenges.
Plotagraph+ is a photo editor designed to make snaps more animated. The results are essentially cinemagraphs – stills with subtle looping animations, such as a flowing river within a landscape, or waving hair in an otherwise stationary portrait. With Plotagraph+, though, you add movement to any existing single image, rather than working from a series of stills or a video.
After you load a photo, you drag ‘animation’ arrows across areas you’d like to move, and use masks or anchor points to define sections that should remain stationary. Speed and crop tools add a modicum of further control. It’s all very straightforward.
The effect is specialized, mind, and only works well with certain images. You won’t, for example, find Plotagraph+ successfully animate a human face. But it works wonders on flowing elements (smoke; clouds; water; hair), and can with care be used to craft visually arresting madness based around shots of architecture.
CARROT Weather is a weather app helmed by a HAL-like artificial intelligence that hates humans. As you check whether it’ll be sunny at the weekend, or if you’ll be caught in a deluge should you venture outside, CARROT will helpfully call you a ‘meatbag’ and pepper its forecasts with snark.
That probably sounds like a throwaway gimmick, but it’s actually a lot of fun – adding color and personality to a kind of app usually devoid of both. Most importantly, though, CARROT Weather is a really good weather app.
The forecasts are clearly displayed, the interface is superb, and the Today view widget is one of the best around. There’s even an amusing mini-game for finding ‘collectable’ hidden locations.
There are some downsides: the rainfall/cloud maps are weak, and there are no notifications. But if you’re bored of the straight-laced, dull competition, and fancy a weather app that’s informative and entertaining, CARROT Weather’s well worth the outlay.
Waterlogue is all about transforming photos – or any other picture you care to load – into luminous watercolors. You shoot a photo or open one already on your iPad, and then choose from one of 14 pre-set styles. Waterlogue will then rapidly ‘paint’ your photo in a manner that looks pleasingly authentic.
Although the app doesn’t offer the level of control (nor the endless playback) of Oilist, you do get a few settings. Brush size, lightness, and borders can be amended, each change providing a thumbnail preview you can tap to have Waterlogue repaint your image.
Export size is reasonable (at 250dpi, you’d get roughly an 8 x 6-inch/21 x 16cm print), and the app as a whole is approachable enough for everyone, while being just about authentic enough to appeal even to those who dabble in real paint.
Axel Scheffler’s Flip Flap Safari is an entertaining digital take on those children’s games where you create weird and wonderful (and occasionally terrifying) creatures by combining different body parts. Here, you get tops and bottoms to swipe between, in order to construct the likes of a ‘zeboceros’ or ‘crocingo’.
Each animal is nicely illustrated and comes with two verses of text, which the app can optionally read aloud. Also, note you don’t have to create strange new animals – you can instead match halves to make normal ones.
Perfect for when your resident tiny person is getting a bit perplexed at seeing a grinning elephant propped up by a spindly pair of flamingo legs.
With Hyp, you’re essentially in digital lava lamp territory. Drag about your iPad’s display, and you’re treated to an ethereal – if somewhat neon – light show that mutates and evolves as you experiment. Ramp up the volume and a soothing responsive soundtrack plays, sucking you further into the chill-out zone.
For the outlay, that alone would do the job, but double-tap and Hyp offers more. You can snap a shot of the current pattern, adjust the speed and complexity of the animation, or prod a randomizer to shake up what you’re seeing and hearing.
We’d love to see an autoplay option too, so Hyp could be played indefinitely with the iPad in a stand; otherwise, this is a simple, smart, engaging slice of digital ambience.
Affinity Photo is the kind of app that should extinguish any lingering doubt regarding the iPad’s suitability as a platform for creative professionals. In essence, the app brings the entirety of Serif’s desktop Photoshop rival (also called Affinity Photo) to Apple’s tablet, and carefully reimagines the interface for touch.
You’ll need at least an iPad Air 2 to run the app, but an iPad Pro for best performance. Then also armed with a digit and/or Apple Pencil, you can delve into a huge range of features for pro-level image editing, creation and retouching.
The live filters and liquify tools are particularly impressive, responding in real-time as you work on adjustments, and make for a surprisingly tactile editing experience. But really pretty much everything’s great here for anyone who wants properly high-end photo editing on their iPad.
Although Addy doesn’t really offer anything new, this is an app that does an awful lot right. It manages to make adding text to images fun, along with providing a no-nonsense interface that marries usability and power.
Load a photo and you can add art, text, and effects, before sharing it. ‘Art’ comprises slogans, shapes, and clip art. This can be recolored and resized, and you can add shadows and adjust opacity. Text is similarly easily added, and there are straightforward spacing and alignment options for tidying typography.
Finally, the effects comprise filters and overlays, the latter being eye-catching but limited in terms of application (you can adjust opacity but not, say, rotation). Still, as a package, Addy’s easy to love, given the speed at which you can work and the quality of the end result.
If you’re only occasionally adding text to an image you might be fine with a free app, but the ease of use and quality results make Addy worth a fiver for everyone else.
There are full-on screenwriting tools for iPad, such as Final Draft, but Untitled is more like a smart notepad – an app for a first draft until you feel ready for, um, Final Draft.
You jot down ideas, and don’t worry about formatting – because the app deals with that. In some cases, it does so automatically – write “Inside TechRadar HQ at midday” and Untitled will convert it to “INT: TECHRADAR HQ – MIDDAY” in the full preview (which can be exported to PDF or HTML).
For dialogue, place the character’s name above whatever they’re saying and Untitled correctly lays everything out.
Some other formatting needs you to remember the odd character - ‘>’ before a transition and ‘.’ before a shot. But that’s not too heavy on the brain, leaving you plenty of headspace to craft your Hollywood breakthrough.
On the Mac, PDF Expert 6 is a friendly, efficient, usable PDF editor. If anything, the app’s often even better on iPad.
You can grab PDFs from iCloud or Dropbox. Pages can be rearranged by drag-and-drop, and you can add or extract pages with a few taps. Adding pages from another document sadly remains beyond the app, but you can merge two PDFs in its file manager.
As a reader, PDF Expert 6 fares well, ably dealing with large PDFs, and the text-to-speech mode can read documents at a speed of your choosing. Similarly, the app makes short work of annotations, document signing, and outline editing.
Buy the ‘Edit PDF’ IAP ($9.99/£9.99/AU$14.99 on top of the original price) and you can directly update text, redact passages, and replace images. You’re obviously a little limited by a document’s existing fonts and layout, but this functionality is great if you spot a glaring error while checking a vital PDF on your iPad.
With visible pixels essentially eradicated from modern mobile device screens, it’s amusing to see retro-style pixel art stubbornly clinging on.
But chunky pixels are a pleasing aesthetic, evoking nostalgia, and you know thought’s gone into the placement of every dot. Pixaki is an iPad pixel art ‘studio’, ideal for illustrators, games designers, and animators.
At its most minimal, the interface shows your canvas and some tool icons: pencil; eraser; fill; shapes; select; color picker. But there are also slide-in panels for layers/palettes, and the frame-based animation system.
Bar a slightly awkward selection/move process, workflow is sleek and efficient (not least with the superb fill tool, which optionally works non-contiguously across multiple layers), and the app has robust, flexible import and export options.
Perhaps most importantly, Pixaki’s just really nice to use – more so than crafting similar art on a PC or Mac, and although pricey it’s worth the money for anyone serious about pixel art.
The iPad may not be an ideal device for shooting photos, but its large screen makes it pretty great for editing them. And Mextures is perhaps the finest app around for anyone wanting to infuse their digital snaps with character by way of textures, grunge, and gradients.
The editing process is entirely non-destructive, with you building up effects by adding layers. In each case, textures, blend modes and rotation of scanned objects can be adjusted to suit, and you can experiment without fear of edits being ‘burned in’.
Particularly interesting combinations can be saved as ‘formulas’ and shared with the Mextures community – or you can speed along your own editing by downloading one of the many formulas that already exist.
There are quite a few dictionary apps on iPad, and most of them don’t tend to stray much from paper-based tomes, save adding a search function. LookUp has a more colorful way of thinking, primarily with its entry screen. This features rows of illustrated cards, each of which houses an interesting word you can discover more about with a tap.
The app is elsewhere a mite more conventional – you can type in a word to confirm a spelling, and access its meaning, etymology, and Wikipedia entry.
The app’s lack of speed and customization means it likely won’t be a writer’s first port of call when working – but it is an interesting app for anyone fascinated by language, allowing you to explore words and their histories in rather more relaxed circumstances.
First impressions of Oilist might lead you to think it’s yet another filter app. And to some extent it is, given that Oilist enables you to feed it a photo and end up with something resembling an oil painting.
However, Oilist also has much in common with generative creativity apps, since it keeps painting over and over, to mesmerizing effect. Additionally, it’s not an app where you select a preset and then sit back and wait – instead, while Oilist is painting, you can adjust settings, and even splatter the virtual canvas with ‘chaos’ paint if the mood takes you.
This is all entertaining in and of itself, but Oilist also has practical benefits – at any point, you can snap the in-progress painting, and the resulting high-res image can be exported for sharing online or even printing on a canvas.
There are so many amazing music-making apps on iPad that it’s hard to choose between them. With Audiobus 3, you sort of don’t have to, because it acts as a kind of behind-the-scenes plumbing.
Virtual cabling might not sound sexy, but it hugely boosts creative potential. You can send live audio or MIDI data between apps and through effects, mix the various channels, and then send the entire output to the likes of GarageBand.
Much of these features are new to Audiobus 3, and this latest update also adds Audio Unit support, enabling you to open some synths and effects directly in the app.
With support for over 900 iOS products in all, Audiobus 3 is an essential buy for anyone serious about creating music on an iPad.
Young children love wooden puzzles, where you plug a load of letters into letter-shaped holes (with a little luck, ones that actually fit). The thing is, those puzzles never change, whereas Endless Alphabet has over a hundred words to play with.
On selecting a word, a horde of colorful monsters sprints across the screen, scattering the letters, which must then be dragged back into place. As you do so, the letters entertainingly grumble and animate. Once the entire word’s complete, a short cut-scene plays to explain what it means.
From start to finish, Endless Alphabet is an excellent and joyful production. The interface is intuitive enough for young toddlers to grasp, and the app’s tactile nature works wonderfully on the iPad’s large display.
The ‘pro’ bit in Redshift Pro’s name is rather important, because this astronomy app is very much geared at the enthusiast. It dispenses with the gimmickry seen in some competing apps, and is instead packed with a ton of features, including an explorable planetarium, an observation planner and sky diary, 3D models of the planetary bodies, simulations, and even the means to control a telescope.
Although more workmanlike than pretty, the app does the business when you’re zooming through the heavens, on a 3D journey to a body of choice, or just lazily browsing whatever you’d be staring at in the night sky if your ceiling wasn’t in the way.
And if it all feels a bit rich, the developer has you covered with the slightly cut down – but still impressive – Redshift, for half the outlay.
Generally speaking, music apps echo real-world instruments, as evidenced by the piano keyboards found in the likes of GarageBand. KRFT is different – along with creating loops and riffs (either by bashing out a tune on a grid of pads, or tapping out notes on a piano roll), you also create the play surface itself.
Designing your instrument in KRFT is all based around shapes and icons – diamonds trigger loops, dials adjust sound properties, and squares can be set to trigger several loops at once.
Admittedly, staring at a blank canvas can intimidate, because you must consider composition and instrument construction as one. But KRFT bundles several inspirational demos to show what it can do – and they’re so much fun they might be worth the entry fee on their own.
Billing itself as a kind of 3D sketchbook, isolad is designed for people who want to quickly draw isometric artwork. Its toolset is simple – you get a line tool for connecting magnetic dots, a shape fill tool, undo, panning and zooming.
That might sound reductive, but isolad’s straightforward nature means anyone can have a crack at doodling the next Monument Valley, and you end up focusing more on what you’re creating rather than being deluged by a load of tools you’ll never use.
Future updates promise the addition of selections and layers, but for now isolad’s elegant simplicity is enough to make it a winning app.
The idea behind Printed is to transform your photos into vintage printed art. You load a photo (or choose from one of the demo images), press a filter, and are suddenly faced with something that could have fallen out of a 50-year-old book, or been posted on a wall many decades ago.
But Printed is more than a tap-and-forget filter app: beyond the filter selection are tools for adjusting dot pitch, brightness, borders, and color saturation.
There are some shortcomings: changes to settings are initially displayed as a thumbnail you tap to approve, which only then gets rendered at full-size (whereupon it may look different from how you thought it would); and landscape orientation appears to have been an afterthought.
But on a large iPad display, the actual filters – which are excellent – are shown off to their fullest, in all their retro dotty glory.
If you’re the kind of person who likes spinning virtual decks, you’ll tell right away with djay Pro that you have in your hands something special. On the iPad – and especially on an iPad Pro – the app has room to breathe, lining up all kinds of features for being creative when playing other people’s music.
You get four-deck mixing, a sampler, varied waveform layouts, and useful DJ tools like cue points and beat-matching. There are also 70 keyboard shortcuts for quickly getting at important features, such as matching keys and adjusting levels.
For a newcomer, it’s perhaps overkill, and the similarly impressive djay 2 is cheaper. But if you’ve got the cash, djay Pro is a best-in-class app suitable for everyone – right up to jobbing DJs.
Even iPads with the largest amount of storage can’t cope with a great deal of on-board video. Infuse Pro is designed to access your collection, without any of it needing to be on your device.
The app connects to local drives and cloud services, and plays a wide range of file types, including MOV, MKV and VIDEO_TS. If the files are named sensibly, Infuse downloads cover art and can optionally grab soft subtitles. The interface throughout is superb.
On iPad, you also get full support for Split View and picture-in-picture, so you can pretend to work while watching your favorite shows. And if you continue on another device – this universal app is compatible with iPhone and Apple TV – cloud sync lets you pick up where you left off.
Reasoning that sketchbooks aren’t complicated, and so nor should your iPad be, Linea offers a friendly approach to digital sketching. The main interface puts all of the app’s tools within easy reach – colors on the left, and layers and brushes on the right. Scribble nearby and they get out of the way, or you can invoke full-screen with a tap.
There’s Pencil support, but no pressure sensing by other means. Also, although some of the pens offer blend modes, the end result still looks quite digital rather than realistic. Even so, Linea’s straightforwardness and smart design tends to make it a joy to use, even if the app lacks the range of some of its contemporaries.
If you find iMovie isn’t quite doing it for you from a video editing standpoint, take a look at LumaFusion. This multitrack editor is designed with the more demanding user in mind, and is packed full of features to keep you editing at your iPad rather than nipping to a Mac or PC.
The main timeline provides you with three tracks for photos, videos, titles and graphics, and you get another three audio tracks for complex audio mixes involving narration and sound effects. Should you wish to take things further, LumaFusion includes a slew of effects and clip manipulation tools seemingly brought over from the developer’s own – and similarly impressive – LumaFX.
Occasionally, the app perhaps lacks some of the elegance iMovie enjoys, and LumaFusion is certainly a more involved product than Apple’s. But if you want fully-fledged video editing on your iPad, it’s hard to think of a better option.
On iPhone, Hipstamatic lets you switch between a virtual retro camera and a sleek modern camera app. On iPad, it all goes a bit weird, with the former option giving you a camera floating in space, and the latter making you wonder why you’d use a tablet for taking snaps.
But Hipstamatic nonetheless gets a recommendation on the basis of other things it does. Load an image from your Camera Roll, and you can delve into Hipstamatic’s editor. If you’re in a hurry, select a predefined style – Vintage; Cinematic; Blogger – and export.
Should you fancy a bit more fine-tuning, you can experiment with lenses, film, and flashes. And plenty of other adjustments are available, too, such as cropping, vignettes, curves, and a really nice depth of field effect.
Wikipedia is, in reality, a massive web of articles, but when browsing, it looks more like a sea of links. WikiLinks rethinks exploring Wikipedia through the use of spider diagrams, providing a clever visual overview of the relationship between subjects.
On iPhone, you switch between views, but the app makes use of the iPad’s larger display by splitting it in two. On the left is your mind map, which grows as you tap on new articles. On the right is your current selection to peruse.
As a reader, WikiLinks is less remarkable – article sections irritatingly begin life collapsed, and it all feels a bit cluttered. But when using Wikipedia for research, no other app is so helpful in enabling you to see the links between the site’s many pages.
If your iPad’s sitting around doing nothing while you work on a Mac or PC, Duet Display can turn it into a handy second screen for your desktop or notebook.
You fire up the app on your iPad and a companion app on your computer, and connect the two devices using a cable – like it’s 2005 or something. Minimalist fetishists might grumble, but a wired connection means there’s almost no lag – even when using Duet Display’s highest detail settings and frame rates.
With macOS Sierra, you also get one extra goodie: a virtual Touch Bar. So you needn’t splash out on a brand-new MacBook Pro to check out Apple’s latest interface innovation – you can use Duet Display instead.
Carl Burton’s Islands: Non-Places is listed in the App Store as a game, but don’t believe a word of it. Really, this ten-scene artistic endeavor is a surreal, mesmerizing semi-interactive animated film.
Each ‘non-place’ is somewhere you’d usually ignore or stay only on a very temporary basis, but here, the mundane is subverted through unusual and unexpected juxtapositions.
You’ll find yourself staring at a luggage carousel, before the bags begin a lazy Mexican wave. Elsewhere, palm trees ride mall escalators, while a run-of-the-mill seating area is suddenly flooded, a warning siren slicing its way through inane background chatter.
The result is frequently disorientating, but Islands also has the capacity to surprise, and is often oddly beautiful.
There are plenty of apps out there that attempt to transform images into something that might once have appeared on the screen of an ancient piece of computer hardware, but none match Retrospecs.
You either take a photo or load an image from your iPad and then select a preset. You get everything from the chunky character-oriented Commodore PET, through to relatively powerful fare such as the detailed 16-bit graphics of the SNES and Atari ST.
From an authenticity standpoint, Retrospecs wins out, but the app also affords plenty of tweaking potential. You can switch modes for those machines that offered multiple resolutions, choose alternate dither patterns, and adjust contrast, vibrancy, and other settings. Best of all, you can use any of the existing presets as the basis for your own unique slice of retro-filter joy.
It’s concert time for the motley crew of Toca Band, in this toy designed to help kids explore music creatively. (And, um, adults who might get sucked in a bit.)
It’s all very simple: drag weird cartoon characters (each of which plays their own instrument) to spots on the stage, and they automatically jam along with the only song that Toca Band appears to know. Lob a musician at the star and they start a unique solo improv with a modicum of user control.
Toca Band is a very sweet app, which even toddlers should be able to grasp. A word of warning, though: that Toca Band riff will quickly become an earworm you’ll be hard pressed to remove.
iA Writer provides a writing environment suitably focused for iPad, but that also makes nods to the desktop.
The main screen is smartly designed, with a custom keyboard bar offering Markdown and navigation buttons; if you’re using a mechanical keyboard, standard shortcuts are supported.
Further focus comes by way of a typewriter mode (auto-scrolling to the area you’re editing) and graying out lines other than the one you’re working on.
Elsewhere, you get an optional live character count, iCloud sync, and a robust Markdown preview. We’d like to see a split-screen mode for the last of those (as per the Mac version), but otherwise iA Writer’s a solid, effective and affordable minimal writing app for iPad.
1972’s ARP Odyssey was a classic of the era, and reborn in 2015 with a smart new design and modern connectors. Now, the duophonic synth is on iPad and, if anything, the digital incarnation beats the hardware original.
With ARP ODYSSEi, you still get the many synthesis controls of the real-world kit, allowing for a huge diversity of sound. The sliders are a mite fiddly, but any frustration is mitigated by the wealth of presets and ability to save your own.
The best bit, though, is the programmable arpeggiator, which transforms sounds into rich, exciting loops. Sadly, the feature is omitted from ODYSSEi’s Korg Gadget incarnation, but as a standalone synth for iPad, this one’s hard to beat.
We're not sure what makes this edition of the famous mockney chef's recipe book 'ultimate', bar that word being very clearly written on the icon.
Still, Jamie Oliver's Ultimate Recipes is certainly a very tasty app. The 600 recipes should satisfy any given mood, whether you're after a sickeningly healthy salad or fancy binging on ALL THE SUGAR until your teeth scream for mercy.
Smartly, every recipe offers step-by-step photos, so you can see how badly you’re going wrong at any point. And when you've nearly burned down the kitchen, given up and ordered a pizza, you can watch the two hours of videos that reportedly tell you how to "become a real kitchen ninja".
Note: this doesn't involve wearing lots of black and hurling sharp objects at walls, sadly.
Music-creation apps can overwhelm, even when trying to be friendly. Lily neatly takes a rather more playful – if slightly twee – stab at having you make tunes.
You start by selecting a color and shape. The former dictates an instrument and the latter the number of leaves on your lily. Tap + to open the flower, and then the flower itself to access a pulsating playback head.
You then tap spaces to lay down notes, which can be shifted entire octaves by prodding adjacent vertical lines. Repeat the process with more lilies and you'll soon have an oddly delicate cacophony serenading your ears.
Lily's a very sweet app. It's perhaps a touch too abstract to be as immediate as it wants to be, but all becomes clear with a little play. We do wish songs could be saved (although you can export a recording) – the lives of these lilies are all too fleeting.
So, you’ve picked up an iPad synth to compose music, play live, or bound about like a maniac, pretending you're on stage at Glastonbury. Fortunately, Poison-202 is ideal for all such sets of circumstances.
The moody black and red graphic design is very 1990s, but it's Poison-202's sounds that hurl you back to the halcyon days of electronic music. Aficionados of The Prodigy, Chemical Brothers and Orbital will be overjoyed at the familiar (and brilliant) sounds you can conjure up simply by selecting presets and prodding a few keys.
And if you're not satisfied by the creator's (frankly awesome) sound design smarts (in which case, we glare at you with the menace of a thousand Keith Flints), all manner of sliders and dials enable you to create your own wall-wobbling bass and ear-searing leads.
There are iPad synths that have more ambition, and many are more authentic to classic hardware; but few are more fun.
For free, Ferrite Recording Studio provides the means to record the odd bit of audio, bookmark important bits, and mash together a few such recordings into something resembling a podcast. But pay the $19.99/£14.99 IAP and this app gives desktop podcast-creation products a run for their money.
Using the smartly designed interface, you can import clips and sounds from various sources, craft multi-track edits that make full use of slicing, fading, ducking, and silence stripping, and add professional effects to give vocals that bit of extra punch.
On an iPhone, this is an impressive app, but on iPad, the extra screen space you get makes for significantly faster editing of your audio and a far superior user experience compared to the cramped screen.
Rather than be all things to all people, Zen Brush 2 is a painting app with a sense of focus, emulating the feel of an East Asian ink brush. It's therefore suited to flowing, semi-abstract artistic effort with your finger to offer a digital take on calligraphy.
On iPhone’s teeny screen this app feels a little redundant, but it comes alive on the iPad's larger display, especially if you have a stylus. The selection of tools is intentionally limited to keep you focused, but you can still swap between a red and black brush, experiment with alternate brush sizes or dryness values and swap out the underlying canvas.
There is a sense of give and take about Zen Brush 2's level of realism: strokes are applied wonderfully, but inks don't interact with each other nor the paper beneath. Still, the strong sense of character gives artwork created in Zen Brush 2 a unique feel and it's a relaxing, almost meditative, app to spend time with.
There are loads of great painting apps for illustrators and artists, but Amaziograph tries something a bit different, introducing you to a world of tessellation and symmetries. This makes for an app that has plenty of potential for professional use, but also one that anyone can enjoy.
To begin, you select a style. The simplest is a split-screen mirror, but there are also kaleidoscope-like options, and those that create tiled, repeating patterns. It's then a question of scribbling on the canvas, and watching a pattern form before your eyes.
The toolset is quite basic (with a bafflingly overthought color palette selector), but Amaziograph chalks up a big win when it comes to flexibility.
At any point, you can adjust the settings of the current grid, or choose a different symmetry/tessellation type. This propels the app far beyond 'toy' territory, opening up avenues for creativity regardless of your level of artistic prowess.
As a combination clock and weather app, Living Earth works well across all iOS devices, but use it with an iPad in a stand and you've got something that'll make other clocks in the immediate vicinity green with envy.
As you might expect, your first job with the app is to define the cities you'd like to keep track of. At any point, you can then switch between them, updating the main clock and weather forecasts accordingly. Tap the weather and you can access an extended forecast for the week; tap the location and you get the current times and weather for your defined locations.
But it's the Earth that gets pride of place, taking up the bulk of the screen. It shows clouds by default, although weather geeks can instead choose colors denoting temperature, wind speed or humidity values. Then with a little swipe the globe rotates, neatly showing heavily populated locations during night time as lattices of artificial man-made light.
Whether you need a few minutes of peace or help to fall asleep after hours of stress, Flowing offers meditative splashy reflection. Choose from six scenes, plonk headphones on and then just sit and listen to gorgeous 3D audio recordings of streams, waterfalls and rivers.
Should you feel the need, noodle about with the parallax photo - although that’s frankly the least interesting bit of the app.
There is room for screen interaction though - the slider button gives you access to a mixer, to trigger ambient soundtracks by composer David Bawiec, and add birdsong and rain; while the Flowing icon houses guided meditations by Lua Lisa.
There’s also a timer, so you can fall asleep to a gently meandering brook without it then burbling away all night. In all, even if you don’t make use of every feature, Flowing is an effective, polished relaxation aid.
Animation can be painstaking, whether doing it for your career or just for fun. Fortunately, Stop Motion Studio Pro streamlines the process, providing a sleek and efficient app for your next animated masterpiece.
It caters to various kinds of animation: you can use your iPad’s camera to capture a scene, import images or videos (which are broken down into stills), or use a remote app installed on an iPhone. Although most people will export raw footage to the likes of iMovie, Stop Motion Pro shoots for a full animation suite by including audio and title capabilities.
There are some snags. Moving frames requires an awkward copy/paste/delete workaround. Also, drawing tools are clumsy, making the app’s claim of being capable of rotoscoping a tad suspect. But as an affordable and broadly usable app for crafting animation, it fits the bill.
Scanners for iPad have come a long way from their roots as souped-up camera apps, and Scanbot 6 is making a play to be the only one on your iPad - by doing way more than just scanning.
The basics are ably dealt with - the app automatically locates documents in front of your iPad’s camera (assuming there’s contrast with the desk underneath), and you can crop, rotate, color-adjust, and save the result.
Buy the Pro IAP, though, and Scanbot becomes far more capable. It’ll run OCR text recognition on any document, and attempt (with a reasonable degree of success) to extract details for single-tap ’actions’, such as triggering a phone call or visiting a website, based on what it finds.
There are annotation and PDF signing tools, and the means to reorder pages in multi-page documents. So rather than being a tap-and-done scanner, this app keeps helping once the scans are done, making it an essential purchase for the office-oriented. (We do miss the smiling robot icon, though – the new one is so dull.)
Another example of a book designed for kids that adults will sneak a peek at when no-one's watching, Namoo teaches about the wonders of plant life. Eschewing the kind of realistic photography or illustration you typically see in such virtual tomes, Namoo is wildly stylized, using an arresting low-poly art style for its interactive 3D simulations.
Each of these is married with succinct text, giving your brain something to chew on as you ping the components of a plant's cells (which emit pleasingly playful - if obviously not terribly realistic - sounds and musical notes) or explore the life cycle of an apple.
On the desktop, Scrivener is widely acclaimed as the writer's tool of choice. The feature-rich app provides all kinds of ways to write, even incorporating research documents directly into projects. Everything's always within reach, and your work can constantly be rethought, reorganised, and reworked.
On iPad, Scrivener is, astonishingly, almost identical to its desktop cousin. Bar some simplification regarding view and export options, it's essentially the same app. You get a powerful 'binder' sidebar for organizing notes and documents, while the main view area enables you to write and structure text, or to work with index cards on a cork board.
There's even an internal 'Split View', for simultaneously smashing out a screenplay while peering at research. With Dropbox sync to access existing projects, Scrivener is a no-brainer for existing users; and for newcomers, it's the most capable rich text/scriptwriting app on iPad.
At the last count, there were something like eleven billion sketching apps for iPad, and so you need something pretty special to stand out. Concepts shoots for a more professional audience - architects, designers, illustrators, and the like - but in doing so presents a far more flexible product than most.
When scribbling on the infinite canvas, you're drawing vector strokes, which can be individually selected and adjusted. The tools area is customizable and colors are selected using a Copic color wheel.
Pay the pro IAP and you unlock all kinds of features, including precision tools and shape guides, endless layers, and the means to export your work as high-res imagery, SVG, DXF or PSD. In use, whether using a finger or stylus, Concepts is elegant and usable but powerful.
So for free, this is an excellent tool for wannabe scribblers, and for the price of a couple of coffees, a high-end digital sketchbook suitable for professionals. Sounds like a bargain either way to us.
Your eyes might pop at the price tag of this iPad synth, but the hardware reissue of this amazing Moog was priced at a wallet-smashing $10,000. By contrast, the Model 15 iPad app seems quite the bargain. To our ears, it's also the best standalone iOS synth on mobile, and gives anything on the desktop a run for its money.
For people used to messing around with modular synths and plugging in patch leads, they'll be in heaven. But this isn't retro-central: you can switch the piano keyboard for Animoog's gestural equivalent; newcomers can work through straightforward tutorials about how to build new sounds from scratch; and those who want to dive right in can select from and experiment with loads of diverse, superb-sounding presets.
There are plenty of apps that enable you to add comic-like filters and the odd speech balloon to your photos, but Comic Life 3 goes the whole hog regarding comic creation. You select from pre-defined templates or basic page layouts, and can then begin working on a Marvel-worrying masterpiece.
Importing images is straightforward, and you get plenty of control over sound effects and speech balloons. For people who are perhaps taking things a bit too seriously (or actual comic creators, who can use this app for quick mock-ups), there's a bundled script editor as well.
Oddly, Comic Life 3's filters aren't that impressive, not making your photos look especially hand-drawn. But otherwise the app is an excellent means of crafting stories on an iPad, and you can export your work in a range of formats to share with friends - and Stan Lee.
It's been a long time coming, but finally Tweetbot gets a full-fledged modern-day update for iPad. And it's a good one, too. While the official Twitter app's turned into a 'blown-up iPhone app' monstrosity on Apple's tablet, Tweetbot makes use of the extra space by way of a handy extra column in which you can stash mentions, lists, and various other bits and bobs.
Elsewhere, this latest release might lack a few toys Twitter selfishly keeps for itself, but it wins out in terms of multitasking support, granular mute settings, superb usability, and an interesting Activity view if you're the kind of Twitter user desperate to know who's retweeting all your tiny missives.
This music app is inspired by layered composition techniques used in some classical music. You tap out notes on a piano roll, and can then have up to four playheads simultaneously interpret your notes, each using unique speeds, directions and transpositions. For the amateur, Fugue Machine is intuitive and mesmerising, not least because of how easy it is to create something that sounds gorgeous.
For pros, it's a must-have, not least due to MIDI output support for driving external software. It took us mere seconds to have Fugue Machine working with Animoog's voices, and the result ruined our productivity for an entire morning.
(Unless you count composing beautiful music when you should be doing something else as 'being productive'. In which case, we salute you.)
There's a miniature revolution taking place in digital comics. Echoing the music industry some years ago, more publishers are cottoning on to readers very much liking DRM-free content. With that in mind, you now need a decent iPad reader for your PDFs and CBRs, rather than whatever iffy reading experience is welded to a storefront.
Chunky is the best comic-reader on iPad. The interface is simple but customisable. If you want rid of transitions, they're gone. Tinted pages can be brightened. And smart upscaling makes low-res comics look good.
Paying the one-off 'pro' IAP enables you to connect to Mac or Windows shared folders or FTP. Downloading comics then takes seconds, and the app will happily bring over folders full of images and convert them on-the-fly into readable digital publications.
You're probably dead inside if you sit down with Metamorphabet and it doesn't raise a smile — doubly so if you use it alongside a tiny human. The app takes you through all the letters of the alphabet, which contort and animate into all kinds of shapes. It suitably starts with A, which when prodded grows antlers, transforms into an arch, and then goes for an amble. It's adorable.
The app's surreal, playful nature never lets up, and any doubts you might have regarding certain scenes — such as floaty clouds representing 'daydream' in a manner that doesn't really work — evaporate when you see tiny fingers and thumbs carefully pawing at the iPad's glass while young eyes remain utterly transfixed.
Pop music is about getting what you expect. Ambient music has always felt subtly different, almost like anything could happen. With generative audio, this line of thinking became reality. Scape gives you a combined album/playground in this nascent genre, from the minds of Brian Eno and Peter Chilvers.
Each track is formed by way of adding musical elements to a canvas, which then interact in sometimes unforeseen ways. Described as music that "thinks for itself", Scape becomes a pleasing, fresh and infinitely replayable slice of chillout bliss. And if you're feeling particularly lazy, you can sit back and listen to an album composed by the app's creators.
Illustration tools are typically complex. Sit someone in front of Adobe Photoshop and they'll figure out enough of it in fairly short order. Adobe Illustrator? No chance. Assembly attempts to get around such roadblocks by turning graphic design into the modern-day touchscreen equivalent of working with felt shapes — albeit very powerful felt shapes that can shift beneath your fingers.
At the foot of the screen are loads of design elements, and you drag them to the canvas. Using menus and gestures, shapes can be resized, coloured, duplicated and transformed. Given enough time and imagination, you can create abstract masterpieces, cartoonish geometric robots, and beautiful flowing landscapes.
It's intuitive enough for anyone, but we suspect pro designers will enjoy Assembly too, perhaps even using it for sketching out ideas. And when you're done, you can output your creations to PNG or SVG.
The lofty boast with RealBeat is that you can use the app to make music with everything. The remarkable thing is, you really can. The app has eight slots for samples, waiting for input from your iPad's mic.
You can record snippets of any audio you fancy: your voice; a spoon smacking a saucepan; a pet, confused at you holding your iPad right in front of its face. These samples can then be arranged into loops and songs using a familiar drum-machine-style sequencer and pattern editor.
Completed masterpieces can be exported using Audio Copy and iTunes File Sharing, and the app also integrates with Audiobus.
On the desktop, Panic's Transmit is a perfectly decent FTP client. But when it was first released for iPad, Transmit felt rather more like the future. It was smart and elegant, utilising all of the then-new iOS features, such as Share sheets.
Even today, its interface seems a step beyond its contemporaries — the vibrant icons and dark lists look gorgeous and modern. Most importantly, the app remains very usable, with an excellent drag-and-drop model, smart previews, and support for a huge range of services, including local shared Mac folders.
Calling Editorial a text editor does it a disservice. That's not to say Editorial isn't any good as a text editor, because it very much is. You get top-notch Markdown editing, with an inline preview, and also a TaskPaper mode for plain text to-do lists.
But what really sets Editorial apart is the sheer wealth of customisation options. You get themes and custom snippets, but also workflows, which can automate hugely complex tasks. You get the sense some of these arrived from the frustrations at how slow it is to perform certain actions on an iPad; but a few hours with Editorial and you'll wish the app was available for your Mac or PC too.
Previously known as iDraw, Graphic is now part of the Autodesk stable. Visually, it looks an awful lot like Adobe Illustrator, and it brings some suitably high-end vector-drawing smarts to Apple's tablet.
All the tools and features you'd expect are present and correct; and while it's admittedly a bit slower and fiddlier to construct complex imagery on an iPad than a PC, Graphic is great to have handy when you're on the move. Smartly, the app boasts plentiful export functions, to continue your work elsewhere, and will sync with its iPhone and Mac cousins across iCloud.
One of the curious things about the iPad is the absence of major Adobe apps from the App Store. The creative giant instead seems content with smaller, simpler 'satellite' apps, assuming users will continue to rely on the desktop for in-depth work. Pixelmator thumbs its nose to such thinking, reworking the majority of its desktop cousin (itself a kind of streamlined Photoshop) for the iPad.
Given the low price tag, this is an astonishingly powerful app, offering brushes, layers, gorgeous filters, levels editing, and more. You need to invest some time to get the most out of Pixelmator, but do so and the app will forever weld itself to your Home screen.
There are plenty of apps that provide the means to turn photos into messages and poster-style artwork. Elsewhere in this list we mention the excellent Retype, for example. But if you hanker after more control, Fontmania is a good bet.
This isn't the most complex or feature-rich app of its kind, but it is extremely pleasing to use. On selecting your photo, you can add a filter. Then it's down to business with typography. The 'Art' section houses frames, dividers, shapes and pre-made 'artworks'. The 'Text' section is for typing out whatever you like, and you can choose from a range of fonts.
Really, it's the interface that makes Fontmania. The simple sidebar is clear and non-intrusive, providing quick access to tools like Color and Shadow. All items added to the canvas can be manipulated using standard iOS gestures, avoiding the awkwardness sometimes seen within this sort of app.
Perhaps best of all, though, Fontmania is a pay-once product. Download and you get access to everything, rather than suddenly discovering a drop shadow or extra font will require digging into your wallet again.
iPad video editors tend to have a bunch of effects and filters lurking within, but with VideoGrade you can go full-on Hollywood. On launch, the app helpfully rifles through your albums, making it easy to find your videos. Load one and you get access to a whopping 13 colour-grading and repair tools.
Despite the evident power VideoGrade offers, the interface is remarkably straightforward. Select a tool (such as Vibrance, Brightness or Tint), choose a setting, and drag to make a change. Drag up before moving your finger left or right to make subtler adjustments.
Smartly, any tool already used gets a little green dash beneath, and you can go back and change or remove edits at any point.
All filters are applied live to the currently shown frame, and you can also tap a button to view a preview of how your entire exported video will look. Want to compare your edit with the original video? Horizontal and vertical split-views are available at the tap of a button. Usefully, favorite filter combinations can be stored and reused, and videos can be queued rather than laboriously rendered individually.
Korg Gadget bills itself as the "ultimate mobile synth collection on your iPad" and it's hard to argue. You get well over a dozen varied synths, ranging from drum machines through to ear-splitting electro monsters, and an intuitive piano roll for laying down notes.
A scene/loop arranger enables you to craft entire compositions in the app, which can then be shared via the Soundcloud-powered GadgetCloud or sent to Dropbox. This is a more expensive app than most, but if you're a keen electronic-music-oriented songwriter with an iPad, it's hard to find a product that's better value.
There are quite a few apps for virtual stargazing, but Sky Guide is the best of them on iPad. Like its rivals, the app allows you to search the heavens in real-time, providing details of constellations and satellites in your field of view (or, if you fancy, on the other side of the world).
Indoors, it transforms into a kind of reference guide, offering further insight into distant heavenly bodies, and the means to view the sky at different points in history. What sets Sky Guide apart, though, is an effortless elegance. It's simply the nicest app of its kind to use, with a polish and refinement that cements its essential nature.
Every now and again, you get an app that ticks all the boxes: it's beautiful, audacious, productive, and nudges the platform forwards. This perfectly sums up Coda, a full-fledged website editor for iPad.
The app's graphic design borrows from the similarly impressive Transmit for iOS, all muted greys and vibrant icons. It's a style we wish Apple would steal. When it comes to editing, you can work remotely or pull down files locally; in either case, you end up working in a coding view with the clout you'd expect from a desktop product, rather than something on mobile.
Naturally, Coda is a fairly niche tool, but it's essential for anyone who regularly edits websites and wants the ability to do so when away from the office.
When you're told you can control the forces of nature with your fingertips that probably puts you more in mind of a game than a book. And, in a sense, Earth Primer does gamify learning about our planet. You get a series of engaging and interactive explanatory pages, and a free-for-all sandbox that cleverly only unlocks its full riches when you've read the rest of the book.
Although ultimately designed for children, it's a treat for all ages, likely to plaster a grin across the face of anyone from 9 to 90 when a volcano erupts from their fingertips.
For most guitarists, sound is the most important thing of all. It's all very well having a massive rig of pedals and amps, but only if what you get out of it blows away anyone who's listening. For our money, BIAS FX is definitely the best-sounding guitar amp and effects processor on the iPad, with a rich and engaging collection of gear.
Fortunately, given the price-tag, BIAS FX doesn't skimp on set-up opportunities either. A splitter enables complex dual-signal paths; and sharing functionality enables you to upload your creations and check out what others have done with the app.
You might argue that Google Maps is far better suited to a smartphone, but we reckon the king of mapping apps deserves a place on your iPad, too. Apple's own Maps app has improved, but Google still outsmarts its rival when it comes to public transport, finding local businesses, saving chunks of maps offline, and virtual tourism by way of Street View.
Google's 'OS within an OS' also affords a certain amount of cross-device sync when it comes to searches. We don't, however, recommend you strap your cellular iPad to your steering wheel and use Google Maps as a sat-nav replacement, unless you want to come across as some kind of nutcase.
Adult colouring books are all the rage, proponents claiming bringing colour to intricate abstract shapes helps reduce stress - at least until you realise you've got pen on your shirt and ground oil pastels into the sofa.
You'd think the process of colouring would be ideal for iPad, but most relevant apps are awful, some even forcing tap-to-fill. That is to colouring what using a motorbike is to running a marathon - a big cheat. Pigment is an exception, marrying a love for colouring with serious digital smarts.
On selecting an illustration, there's a range of palettes and tools to explore. You can use pencils and markers, adjusting opacity and brush sizes, and work with subtle gradients. Colouring can be 'freestyle', or you can tap to select an area and ensure you don't go over the lines while furiously scribbling. With a finger, Pigment works well, but it's better with a stylus; with an iPad Pro and a Pencil, you'll lob your real books in the bin.
The one niggle: printing and accessing the larger library requires a subscription in-app purchase. It's a pity there's no one-off payment for individual books, but you do get plenty of free illustrations, and so it's hard to grumble.
Podcasts are mostly associated with small portable devices - after all, the very name is a mash-up of 'iPod' and 'broadcast'. But that doesn't mean you should ignore your favourite shows when armed with an iPad rather than an iPhone.
We're big fans of Overcast on Apple's smaller devices, but the app makes good use of the iPad's extra screen space, with a smart two-column display. On the left, episodes are listed, and the current podcast loads into the larger space on the right.
The big plusses with Overcast, though, remain playback and podcast management. It's the one podcast app we've used that retains plenty of clarity when playback is sped up; and there are clever effects for removing dead air and boosting vocals in podcasts with lower production values.
Playlists can be straightforward in nature, or quite intricate, automatically boosting favourites to the top of the list, and excluding specific episodes. And if you do mostly use an iPhone for listening, Overcast automatically syncs your podcasts and progress, so you can always pick up where you left off.
On opening Toca Nature, you find yourself staring at a slab of land floating in the void. After selecting relevant icons, a drag of a finger is all it takes to raise mountains or dig deep gullies for rivers and lakes.
Finishing touches to your tiny landscape can then be made by tapping to plant trees. Wait for a bit and a little ecosystem takes shape, deers darting about glades, and fish swimming in the water. Using the magnifying glass, you can zoom into and explore this little world and feed its various inhabitants.
Although designed primarily for kids, Toca Nature is a genuinely enjoyable experience whatever your age.
The one big negative is that it starts from scratch every time — some save states would be nice, so each family member could have their own space to tend to and explore. Still, blank canvases keep everything fresh, and building a tiny nature reserve never really gets old.
The fairly large screen of the iPad means you can access desktop-style websites, rather than ones hacked down for iPhone. That sounds great until you realise most of them want to fire adverts into your face until you beg for mercy.
Old people will wisely suggest 'RSS', and then they'll explain that means you can subscribe to sites and get their content piped into an app.
Reeder 3 is a great RSS reader for iPad. It's fast, efficient, caches content for offline use and — importantly — bundles a Readability view. This downloads entire articles for RSS feeds that otherwise would only show synopses.
Like on the iPhone, Reeder's perhaps a bit gesture-happy, but it somehow feels more usable on the iPad's larger display. And we're happy to see the app continue to improve its feature set, including Split View and iPad Pro support, font options for the article viewer, and the means to sync across Instapaper content.
Although Apple introduced iCloud Keychain in iOS 7, designed to securely store passwords and payment information, 1Password is a more powerful system. Along with integrating with Safari, it can be used to hold identities, secure notes, network information and app licence details. It's also cross-platform, meaning it will work with Windows and Android.
And since 1Password is a standalone app, accessing and editing your information is fast and efficient. The core app is free – the company primarily makes its money on the desktop. However, you’ll need a monthly subscription or to pay a one-off $9.99/£9.99/AU$14.99 IAP to access advanced features (multiple vaults, Apple Watch support, tagging, and custom fields).
The vast majority of iPads in Apple's line-up don't have a massive amount of storage, and that becomes a problem when you want to keep videos on the device. Air Video HD gets around the problem by streaming video files from any Mac or PC running the free server software. All content is live-encoded as necessary, ensuring it will play on your iPad, and there's full support for offline viewing, soft subtitles, and AirPlay to an Apple TV.
Perhaps the best bit about the software is how usable it is. The app's simple to set up and has a streamlined, modern interface - for example, a single tap downloads a file for local storage. You don't even need to be on the same network as your server either - Air Video HD lets you access your content over the web. Just watch your data downloads if you're on 3G!
Apple's own Calendar app is fiddly and irritating, and so the existence of Fantastical is very welcome. In a single screen, you get a week view, a month calendar and a scrolling list of events. There's also support for reminders, and all data syncs with iCloud, making Fantastical compatible with Calendar (formerly iCal) for macOS.
The best bit, though, is Fantastical's natural-language input, where you can type an event and watch it build as you add details, such as times and locations. On iPad, we do question the layout a little - a large amount of space is given over to a month calendar view. Still, in portrait or, better, Split View, Fantastical 2 is transformative.
You're not going to make the next Hollywood hit on your iPad, but iMovie's more than capable of dealing with home movies. The interface resembles its desktop cousin and is easy to get to grips with.
Clips can be browsed, arranged and cut, and you can then add titles, transitions and music. For the added professional touch, there are 'trailer templates' to base your movie on, rather than starting from scratch.
And should your iPad be powerful enough, this app will happily work with and export footage all the way up to 4K, which will likely make anyone who used to sit in front of huge video workstations a decade or two ago wide-eyed with astonishment.
Touch Press somewhat cornered the market in amazing iOS books with The Elements, but Journeys of Invention takes things a step further. In partnership with the Science Museum, it leads you through many of science's greatest discoveries, weaving them into a compelling mesh of stories.
Many objects can be explored in detail, and some are more fully interactive, such as the Enigma machine, which you can use to share coded messages with friends.
What's especially great is that none of this feels gimmicky. Instead, this app points towards the future of books, strong content being married to useful and engaging interactivity.
It's not like Microsoft Word really needs introduction. Unless you've been living under a rock that itself is under a pretty sizeable rock, you'll have heard of Microsoft's hugely popular word processor. What you might not realize, though, is how good it is on iPad.
Fire up the app and you're greeted with a selection of handy templates, although you can of course instead use a blank canvas. You then work with something approximating the desktop version of Word, but that's been carefully optimized for tablets. Your brain keeps arguing it shouldn't exist, but it does — although things are a bit fiddly on an iPad mini.
Wisely, saved documents can be stored locally rather than you being forced to use Microsoft's cloud, and they can be shared via email. (A PDF option exists for recipients without Office, although it's oddly hidden behind the share button in the document toolbar, under 'Send Attachment', which may as well have been called 'beware of the leopard'.)
Something else that's also missing: full iPad Pro 12.9 support in the free version. On a smaller iPad, you merely need a Microsoft account to gain access to most features. Some advanced stuff — section breaks; columns; tracking changes; insertion of WordArt — requires an Office 365 account, but that won't limit most users.
Presumably, Microsoft thinks iPad Pro owners have money to burn, though, because for free they just get a viewer. Bah.
There are loads of note-taking apps for the iPad, but Notability hits that sweet spot of being usable and feature-rich. Using the app's various tools, you can scribble on a virtual canvas, using your finger or a stylus. Should you want precision copy, you can drag out text boxes to type into. It's also possible to import documents.
One of the smartest features, though, is audio recording. This enables you to record a lecture or meeting, and the app will later play back your notes live alongside the audio, helping you see everything in context. Naturally, the app has plenty of back-up and export options, too, so you can send whatever you create to other apps and devices.
Apple's Photos app has editing capabilities, but they're not terribly exciting — especially when compared to Snapseed. Here, you select from a number of from a number of tools and filters, and proceed to pinch and swipe your way to a transformed image.
You get all the basics - cropping, rotation, healing brushes, and the like — but the filters are where you can get really creative.
There are blurs, photographic effects, and more extreme options like 'grunge' and 'grainy film', which can add plenty of atmosphere to your photographs. The vast majority of effects are tweakable, mostly by dragging up and down on the canvas to select a parameter and then horizontally to adjust its strength.
Brilliantly, the app also records applied effects as separate layers, each of which remains fully editable until you decide to save your image and work on something else.
Soulver is more or less the love child of a spreadsheet and the kind of calculations you do on the back of an envelope. You write figures in context, and Souvler extracts the maths bits and tots up totals; each line's results can be used as a token in subsequent lines, enabling live updating of complex calculations. Drafts can be saved, exported to HTML, and also synced via Dropbox or iCloud.
Initially, the app feels a bit alien, given that people have been used to digital versions of desktop calculators since the dawn of home computing. But scribbling down sums in Soulver soon becomes second nature.
We're big fans of the Foldify apps, which enable people to fashion and customise little 3D characters on an iPad, before printing them out and making them for real. This mix of digital painting, sharing (models can be browsed, uploaded and rated) and crafting a physical object is exciting in a world where people spend so much time glued to virtual content on screens.
But it's Foldify Dinosaurs that makes this list because, well, dinosaurs. Who wouldn't be thrilled at the prospect of making a magenta T-Rex with a natty moustache? Should that person exist, we don't want to meet them.
When someone talks about bringing back the sounds of the 1980s, your head might fill with Human League and Depeche Mode, but if you played games, you'll instead think of Rob Hubbard and Martin Galway, chip-tune pioneers whose music graced the C64, leveraging the power of the MOS Technology 6581/8580 SID (Sound Interface Device) chip.
SidTracker64 is a niche but wonderfully designed iPad app that's a complete production package for creating SID tunes. It's unashamedly retro in terms of sound, but boasts a modern design, with powerful editing and export functionality. If you're only into raw chip-tune noises, Audiobus and Inter-App Audio are supported; but if you're an old-hand, you'll be delighted at the bundled copy of Hubbard's Commando, ready for you to remix.
The best PS4 Pro deals and bundles in the January sales 2018
If you're looking for a PS4 Pro deal or bundle to dive into the world of 4K gaming, we're here to find you the absolute best price out there. At this time of year, we're seeing some healthy discounts. They're selling fast though, so if you see a deal you like, be sure to bag it before it's too late.
Below you'll find all of the latest and best PS4 Pro prices from the big name stores in our comparison chart. There's not too much difference in price between retail stores this time of year, but we're constantly on the lookout for the latest deals and bundles. Looking to buy in Australia? You'll want to take a look at our AU page.
If you'd prefer a standard PS4, then check out our PS4 bundles page. Don't forget to top up your subscription with one of our discounted PlayStation Plus deals too.
So keep this page bookmarked to stay informed of the latest PS4 Pro bundles when they arrive. If you're looking for more information on the PS4 Pro, take a look at our handy Q&A below the bundles.
PS4 Pro bundle deals (USA) PS4 Pro bundle deals (UK)Need an extra controller on the cheap? Take a look at the best DualShock 4 deals.
We also have a guide to the best PlayStation VR deals too.
If you're buying a PS4 Pro, you'll probably need a cheap PlayStation Plus deal too. PlayStation Plus (aka PS Plus or PS+) allows you to play PS4 games online, along with access to the Instant Game Collection, a bunch of free games for PS4, PS3 and Vita each month. The default price for a year is £40. We've shopped around for you though and found a range of prices. So check out our guide of you want the best PlayStation Plus deals.
What is the PS4 Pro?Essentially, the PS4 Pro is an upgrade of the PS4, rather than a 'next-gen' console. The keywords to take in from the PS4 Pro are 4K and HDR. The new machine will allow game developers to include 4K options in their games, so expect the like of Uncharted 4, Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, Days Gone, Horizon: Zero Dawn and more to look even better on a 4K TV.
HDR, or High Dynamic Range is the other buzzword to be excited about as the PS4 Pro will allow for extra detail to be seen on a range of games and also a wider range of colors not usually displayed by traditional HD TVs.
Will my old PS4 games work on PS4 Pro?Absolutely. If you're planning on upgrading to a PS4 Pro from an older PS4, all of your games will still work. Not every title will be patched to take advantage of the new 4K/HDR capabilities, but the default upscaling (if you have a 4K TV) will more than likely see some improvement to the visuals and the improved console power may give the frame-rate a boost on some titles.
What else can I watch in 4K/HDR on PS4 Pro?The PS4 Pro is compatible with 4K and HDR, and the content options for both are increasing all the time on services like Amazon Prime Instant Video and Netflix. Sony has already confirmed there will be hundreds of hours of 4K Netflix content at launch. There's a lot of free 4K content on the YouTube app too.
Does the PS4 Pro support 4K Blu-rays?No. This was a surprise if we're honest, especially as the new Xbox One S console does. It's a bit of a gamble for Sony, but at the same time, 4K Blu-rays are very expensive for now and many consumers look to digital services to provide their 4K movies and TV content.
Do I need a 4K TV to run a PS4 Pro?No, the PS4 Pro will still work on a regular 1080p TV, you won't get the benefits of upscaling or HDR though. You may see a slim amount of extra detail, or frame-rate boost, but we wouldn't expect a massive leap.
If you are thinking of buying a 4K TV soon, then it's probably a good idea to splash out on the PS4 Pro instead of the regular or new PS4 Slim as it'll future proof you for a while. Be sure to look out for a TV that supports HDR too, in order to take full advantage of the PS4 Pro's capabilities.
Will PlayStation VR be better on the PS4 Pro?Early reports say yes. The PlayStation VR frame-rate is better on PS4 Pro and the resolution gets a bit of a bump too. PlayStation VR will certainly work on the older PS4s, you don't need a PS4 Pro to get involved there.
Does the PS4 Pro have optical audio support?Yes! The optical audio output has been removed from the PS4 Slim though, which is a massive shame. PS4 Pro owners though will still be able to use optical connections for their soundbars and sound systems.
What are the best games on PS4 Pro?We've dived through our back catalog of PS4 games that have received a PS4 Pro update patch to see which ones look the best and have a noticeable difference. Take a look at our extensive feature - The best PS4 Pro games.
The best iPhone SE deals in January 2018
It finally seems to have happened. iPhone SE deal prices may finally have bottomed out. After the fanfare that met Apple's 2016 launch of a budget handset, iPhone SE prices have fallen steadily since. But after a few months of plateaued contract plans, we reckon that the SE is now as cheap as it ever will be.
There are are now plenty of tariffs going for less than £20 per month, which includes the 128GB model. Plus, thanks to some epic cashback offers on varying networks, you can now get the iPhone SE for as little as an effective £14 per month. That's exceptional value.
The tech world rejoiced when the iPhone SE was released. Finally a new Apple phone that doesn't require you to remortgage your house - unlike the iPhone X! It looks and feels exactly the same as the iPhone 5S. But instead of sporting two-year-old hardware it's fully up to date, with a super-fast CPU and graphics, and the 12MP iSight camera straight out of the iPhone 6S.
If cheap iPhone SE deals are what you seek, then you've definitely come to the right place. Use TechRadar's comparison chart to easily find the ideal plan, or scroll down further to find our pick of the best SE deals on the market.
More options: iPhone 8 deals | iPhone 7 deals | iPhone 6S deals | iPhone deals | Best mobile phone deals | iPhone SE review
Top 5 best iPhone SE deals across all UK networks:Lower down the page you'll be able to read about all of the best iPhone SE deals on a model-by-model and network-by-network basis. But first of all here are the best deals so you can instantly see what the best offers are from O2, Three and Vodafone, with EE deals currently leading the pack.
Launched back in March 2016, the 'Special Edition' iPhone SE was a rare example of Apple dropping its entry-level price to allow bargain-hunters a piece of the iPhone pie. It reduced the screen size from the iPhone 6, but kitted it out with the same camera as the iPhone 6S. In short, it's a premium smartphone with a lower price tag – and we like that!
Read TechRadar's full iPhone SE review
Now let's break down the best iPhone SE deals by network...
The best business productivity gadgets
Laptops have overtaken desktop PCs as the preferred workhorse machines for most companies, regardless of the size, and it is easy to see why.
The performance, feature, and price gap between the two have shrunk considerably, so much so that other than for niche use cases that require a fixed workstation, a laptop is generally preferable to a desktop computer.
But while laptops are mobile computers, they do rely, sometimes, on accessories to boost their capabilities.
We've rounded up some of these clever extras, from an ultra-secure USB drives, through a tiny docking station, to one of the weirdest gadgets ever to land on Techradar Pro, courtesy of a Kickstarter campaign.
Want to make sure you've also got the best of the basics? Check out: Best gadgets 2017: the top tech you can buy right now
Many of us know the pain of conference calls being ruined by poor connection or call quality, and with many businesses today choosing to embrace mobile working ideas and services, the need to stay flexible yet connected is paramount.
Sennheiser is looking to solve these woes with its ultra-mobile TeamConnect Wireless - in essence a portable conference room, which can be packed up and carried around for workers on the go. Made up of four speakers, all carried around in a stylish case which doubles as a charging hub, the system can be connected to any laptop, smart device or VC system via Bluetooth, USB or 3.5mm jack. Set-up is quick and easy, allowing users to get up and running in a matter of minutes, with Sennheiser saying the kit can support up to 24 participants at once. Our tests showed the audio quality to be very effective, even with multiple participants on different lines, with no connectivity issues.
The ultra-portable design of the TeamConnect Wireless is the major selling point here, as the stylish case is able to charge up the speakers to ensure you're never caught short, and takes up less space than a rucksack. However this stylish product doesn't come cheap, costing £3,940, meaning it may be out of the price range for some SMBs. For those that can splash out though, this is an eye-catching piece of kit that allows you to stay connected and conversant with your team or customers wherever you are.
Keeping workplace data safe is a major consideration for many workers, and the Aegis Secure Key 3Z features one of the toughest alternatives around.
Primarily targeting those workers who are out and about a lot, and also want to keep their valuable information secure, the device is equipped with a physical keypad to protect what's inside.
Despite only being the size of a regular USB stick, the Aegis Secure Key 3Z is one tough cookie, able to stand up to almost any work environments. The rubber exterior, which is IP58 protective against dust and water, safeguards a rugged aluminium build inside and out, meaning that there is no easy way to break into this device.
The Aegis Secure Key 3Z also features top-of-the-range encryption that meets government standards alongside the onboard keyboard to enter a custom PIN and access the data within. Despite all this protection, setting up and using the device is fairly straightforward, not requiring any extra software or complex processes, with all the protection contained within.
In fact, the only downside appears to be the high price - at $79 for the 8GB model we reviewed, this is a far pricier alternative than other devices around today. But if security is your number one concern, then this is the storage device for you.
If you're looking for a slim and stylish accessory to help guide you through your presentations, then Logitech may have just the tool for you. The company has released a new edition of its Spotlight presentation remote, promising "a whole new standard" in presentation control.
The new product offers a stylish minimalist design made out of polished metal, weighing in at just 49g, with the slim build meaning it sits nicely in the palm of your hand. Three programmable buttons on the front giving you the opportunity to control your presentation however you like. The remote is able to highlight and magnify certain areas on screen, allowing you to focus on specific items or points, and has a range of up to 30 metres for those grander presenting occasions, connecting via Bluetooth to your Windows, Mac OS, Chrome OS or Android device.
It even comes with a timer, which can show how long you've been speaking for and vibrate to tell you if you're about to run over your allotted presentation time. Battery life is substantial enough to last you through a working day, and is quickly recharged.
The only downside is the price - at £119.95, it is quite an expensive option, but if you're looking for an effective and stylish presentation helper, this is the tool for you.
If you're someone who travels for work a lot, staying powered up on the move may often prove a challenge. Although power banks for mobile devices have been popular for some time, anyone looking for a laptop equivalent could be caught short. However Orico's new SC28 offering provides a huge capacity that should be perfect for staying charged up on a trip. With a capacity of 28,800mAh, the SC28 provides easily enough juice for even the thirstiest laptops, which can be quickly recharged via USB or power socket.
The latter features a number of adaptors for different markets, meaning you should never be caught short, with Orico promising five hours of life for a 13in laptop. The SC28 can charge up to three devices at once, meaning you can power your laptop, phone and router all at once for the ideal mobile working solution. The device itself looks stylish, with a sleek aluminium alloy body that weighs in at just under 1kg, but should still easily slip into a rucksack or laptop bag.
In modern busy offices, it can be tricky to get some quiet - particularly if you’re trying to carry out a conference call or video meeting from your desk. Sennheiser, which is perhaps better known for its consumer headphone line, is looking to address this with a new headset targeted at business customers.
The MB 660 may resemble normal ‘cans’ style headphones, but in fact can act as a Bluetooth-enabled wireless headset, allowing you to use them as a meeting accessory in today’s UC-dominated workplace.
As you would expect from a brand such as Sennheiser, the audio quality is excellent, whether that’s with a voice call, watching video or even listening to music. This is complimented by the noise-cancelling ability of the headset, which comes with three separate settings that allow you to select your level of isolation. This high-standard audio quality does come at a price, but if you value your calls and media, it may be worth shelling out.
The headset comes with its own stylish and compact carry case, which also house the charging cables and USB connector. Battery life was excellent, with the headset not needing a recharge during our week-long test - and when we did plug it in, recharging was quick and effective.
If you've just started your own business, or need to work from home often, having a flexible and reliable technology set-up should be one of your top priorities.
In order to keep you from wasting time setting up complex systems, teleconferencing experts GoToMeeting have you covered with an all-in-one box of tools that should allow you to get up and running quickly.
The pack contains an Asus Chromebox PC, Logitech wireless keyboard, Logitech 1080p HD webcam and a FLX UC 500 conference phone from Revo labs - pretty much everything you need to get started.
The products have all been specially selected to work seamlessly together, meaning most of the usual set-up process can be sped through quickly and easily - even if you're not particularly tech-savvy.
Setting up your new kit can be done in a matter of minutes - all you need is a monitor to hook the PC and webcam up to, with all the rest of the hardware able to just plug and play.
The tiny Chromebox PC is incredibly powerful for something so small (at just 12.4cm wide and 4.2cm tall), coming with a powerful 1.7Ghz processor, 4GB of RAM and 16GB storage, making it a great choice if you are strapped for space in your office. The PC also features 4 USB ports alongside DP, HDMI and LAN connectors, offering everything you should need to get started.
Space saving is also helped by the Logitech wireless keyboard, which connects to the Chromebox via USB tracker, and also includes a trackpad in place of a mouse. If you do prefer using a physical mouse, you'll have to splash out on a separate piece.
All the devices work together quickly and easily, meaning you'll be able to start working, calling and even videoconferencing in no time. The webcam is once again surprisingly powerful for its size, offering a smooth video experience, although we did see some slowdown in some cases.
The only minor downside is the need to buy the entire package, meaning that if you only need a conference phone, or a compact PC, you may be better off buying these separately.
At the time of writing, the kit is only available to buy in the USA, costing $999, with a subscription fee of $99 a month, making it a fairly pricey proposition - however if you're already an existing GoToMeeting customer, it can be built into your current subscription.
More and more industries are now choosing to use mobile devices in day-to-day operations out in the field thanks to their portability.
The FLIR ONE Pro offers a compact and powerful thermal imaging camera than can show up in-depth information about the world around you.
Attaching via USB-C, the device clips onto the bottom of your phone, acting as an extension to your normal camera, and displaying heat information on the world around you, with hotter objects showing up in brighter colours (see below).
The technology could prove incredibly useful for a number of industries, such as home inspectors looking to find insulation leaks, or electricians aiming to identify an over-heating connection.
You’ll need to download and register with the free FLIR ONE app in order to start using the device, which is an unneeded extra step for many, but does grant you access to the company’s helplines, galleries and app store.
The actual app was often slow to recognise when we had the device plugged in and turned on, however, and sometimes failed to detect it at all, which was slightly annoying for us, but for a worker in the field could be a major hindrance to getting your work done.
Once you do get it up and running, however, the FLIR ONE Pro’s VividIR imaging system reveals a wealth of information on the world around you, and the compact build and design means it’s easy to carry around (although could also make it easier to lose in a crowded toolbox as well….)
Battery life is also not very long, with our tests only finding the device lasting just over an hour, although re-charging was a speedy process. If you’re out working in the field with a cable though, this could be a major downside.
The FLIR ONE Pro also doesn't come cheap, costing £349.95 in the UK, but it could prove invaluable for workers in such specialised areas, and is definitely worth your consideration.
TP-Link says that the M7650 is the fastest Wi-Fi router it has ever made, offering speeds of up to 600MBps, which is easily enough to stream video to your laptop or tablet whilst on the move, as well as high-quality VoLTE audio through your phone - useful if you don't want to miss that conference call.
Our tests found that the device often reached speeds of over 500MBps, which is impressive for central London, and more than enough to enjoy reliable connections whilst on the move.
The M7650 can support up to 32 devices at once, meaning you can set up multiple connections around the home, or even in a small office if needs be - although speeds will drop if you do so. Set up is remarkably easy, requiring you to just insert the SIM card and turn on, making this much more straightforward than other similar devices.
Battery life for the device was excellent, lasting a full working day with ease, as TP-Link says that the M7650 can offer up to 15 hours of juice, and recharging the huge 3000mAh battery is also quick and easy using the microUSB port.
The M7650 is also light and portable, being small enough to fit inside a jacket pocket, and its rubber build will help protect from any accidental drops or bumps.
However buying the device in the UK is a bit tricky, as you'll have to go through a reseller. This means you'll also need to be on the lookout for differing price options, but if you get the right deal, the M7650 is a must-have.
We love our smartphones so much so that we carry them all the time even at our work, prompting businesses to consider shedding regular landlines and simply embrace the BYOD (bring your own device) paradigm.
Which is why it is so surprising that few companies have come up with a product like the Invoxia NVX200. In a nutshell, this £209 device converts/transforms your smartphone into a desk phone with a Bluetooth speaker and a charging dock thrown in. It comes with a bunch of connectors and adaptors to connect most smartphones.
While most Apple devices (including the iPod, iPad and iPhone) are supported, you won’t be able to connect any smartphone with a USB Type-C port although Invoxia may decide in a near future to ship an additional connector for free. A clever adjustable stand means that any device will sit snuggly on the NVX200. Connect the device via Bluetooth to the latter, put your smartphone in place and you’re ready to go.
Hold down the voicemail key bring up the settings and you will be able to configure the device to your taste, down to the ringtones. Outwardly, it looks just like a normal desk phone, with lots of curves, a soft surface and a handset with a cable that’s sufficiently long for the user to stand up. Setting it up is straight forward: connect the device to a power socket, dock your smartphone, connect it to the NVX200 via Bluetooth and you’re ready to go. We did encounter some issues though.
The test smartphone, a Sony Xperia Z3, has a micro USB port located on the side rather than at the bottom of the device. To make matters worse, it is not anywhere near the middle which makes it impossible to dock in landscape mode. Things got a bit more complicated when you factor in the casing used to protect it.
Altogether a wireless solution, which integrates no-wires charging, might have been a better solution but would have restricted its appeal. We couldn’t get the speaker to play music wirelessly but it did somehow play music via the micro USB connector but only, and only if Bluetooth is disconnected.
It is worth noting that a more expensive version of the NVX200, called the NVX220, comes with built-in VoIP capabilities and costs £289 although you would need an app, one that hasn’t been updated for more than a year.
Fed up with losing your connectivity when out and about? Then check out the Multivox Multisim. It is a service that allows access to multiple UK mobile networks from a single SIM card.
No need to swap tiny pieces of PCB or opt for a sub-optimal dual-SIM smartphone to eliminate the issues associated with poor connectivity, especially when you are out and about. The technology works on almost any recent smartphones and feature phones and doesn’t need a dedicated app.
If there is no coverage on the primary access network, then your phone will search for another available UK mobile network and if there is one available, it will connect to it. If there are multiple networks available, then it will pick up and run on the network with the strongest signal.
The Multisim works without having to manually select a different network to switch to and you get to keep your phone number regardless of the network. The only caveat is that a call will drop when the network being used loses coverage altogether; there is no “incall” switching.
You get unlimited UK calls to mobiles and landlines as well as unlimited texts, all courtesy of EE’s network. Four data packages are available, ranging from 2GB (£29.40) to 10GB (£41.90) excluding VAT. The packages can be configured at Immervox.
There are a fair few solutions available for digitally-savvy globetrotters looking who whiz across the globe for leisure or pleasure. We might have uncovered one of the best ones yet.
From Knowroaming comes a global hotspot that uses a Novatel Wireless Mi-fi, the 6630, and can connect you up in more than 140 countries with 92 of them offering unlimited data for a flat fee of $7.99 per day (about £6.40), a price that even include free, unlimited Whatsapp.
We tried it during a recent trip to Japan where the cost of connectivity is prohibitive and international data roaming is a no-no unless you want to spend hundreds. The Mi-fi device comes in a nice pouch with a few accessories; we just took it out and used it for a few days. It is sturdy enough to withstand a few knocks.
The 6630 is about the size of a Tic-tac box and its user interface is intuitive with only three buttons and a small screen on its front. On top is the power button as well as two USB ports, one for charging up and the other to provide power to external devices.
Inside the 6630 is a 4,000mAh battery that can power the device for up to 20 hours. It is compatible with Cat4 LTE although KnowRoaming only supported 3G for now and an LTE offer is in the pipeline. In use, the service was as seamless as it could be.
Switch it on and connect to it using the provided login details. Note that you can’t change these from the device itself; that can only be done by accessing the device via a browser. Various options exist on the Mi-fi device including the ability to set a number of restrictions, the ability to view your consumption, the number of devices connected at any time and the battery life left. The 6630 supports dual-band 802.11n Wi-Fi but no 802.11ac.
Since this is primarily marketed as a business device, it comes with a number of security features including VPN pass-through, NAT firewall, security hardened web interface, Anti-CSRF (Cross-Site Request Forgery) and session timeouts. Sadly though you won’t be able to buy a consumer version of that yet. Instead, the device is only being sold to corporates for $199 (about £160) with discounts being offered for multiple purchases.
As it stands, the service is meant to be managed centrally by an administrator or IT manager with an entire backend, cloud-based infrastructure provided by KnowRoaming. Suggested improvement to the Mi-fi device would include a thinner, more pocketable model, support for 802.11ac, the inclusion of a microSD card reader and having a smartphone app to allow you to access admin essential information from your smartphone, rather than through a browser.
Find out more at Knowroaming
If you've ever been stuck for mobile signal when travelling to a new country, then the NUU Konnect i1 could be the gadget for you.
Able to provide 4G connections in over 100 countries, the i1 looks to offer a simple, portable way to get online wherever you are in the world.
Most current mobile hotspots are only able to connect to 3G networks, so the Konnect i1 already has an advantage there, thanks to its LTE Cat 6 Qualcomm modem.
The device supports VPNs and Wi-Fi calling, and is equipped with LTE bands 1/2/3/4/5/7/8/17/20/39/40/41, meaning there's a wide range of possible connections.
NUU Mobile says that it is trying to target frequent travellers with the Konnect i1. The device itself is small enough and light enough to easily slip into your pocket, and is able to power up using its microUSB port.
Setting up is easy enough, with the capacity to connect up to five devices at any one time.
What's more, you'll only play a flat rate of $10 a day to use the device as much as you want, with no contract or sign-up fees.
However, after the first 500MB of data, you'll be dialled back to HSPA+ networks for the next 500MB you use, and then down again to just 128Kbps speeds for anything more than that, unless you spend more for further LTE usage.
For the moment, you can only get hold of the Konnect i1 if you backed the product on Kickstarter, with news of a wider release not available just yet.
If you're in the market for something a bit more heavyweight when it comes to your 4G roaming needs, then you may be interested in the YRoam YR4.
YRoam's services are available in over 100 countries worldwide, including popular business travel destinations such as the USA, Singapore and France.
Simply select one of the company's price plans, starting at 5.9p per MB when you buy a 2GB worldwide package.
If you're only travelling to one location, YRoam also offers a UK, US or EU specific package, lasting for 30 days.
Any data usage you purchase can be used either on a PAYG basis, or the ability to top up later.
YRoam also offers discounted rates for connections in your home country, say if you're out in a remote locations not served by your current provider, starting at just 3p per MB.
You can connect up to five devices at any time, meaning you could have a laptop, phone, tablet and more all online at once.
The device features a huge 6,000mAh battery, although this does mean that you're stuck with a fairly heavyweight build.
However this means that the device doubles up as a power bank to recharge your devices in case of an emergency, with a USB and microUSB port to connect up.
Overall though this is a sturdy hotspot that should serve you well wherever you are in the world.
TheBestVPNFor.Me
If you thought that the era of writing stuff down using pen and paper was dead, then Moleskine is here to prove you wrong.
The iconic notebook provider, well-known for its leather-bound pages, is embracing the technology world with its new Smart Writing Set, which it says combines the pleasure of writing with pen and paper with the ease and speed of editing offered by modern word processing software.
The kit consists of a smart Pen+ tool, which, when used to write on the accompanying 'Paper Tablet', will also display what you are writing on an accompanying phone or tablet device. Connected via Bluetooth, your device, boosted by the Moleskine Notes App, then allows you to record and edit your scribblings, meaning you can add extra colour, highlights and more.
The app, which is available on iOS and Android devices, stores all the writing done in your Paper Tablet, meaning you can delete or move pages across devices, and even sync using your Google Drive or Evernote account.
As for the kit itself, it resembles your traditional writing tools, with the Pen+ taking after a standard fountain pen - albeit with a hidden camera by the nib which traces and digitises everything you write. The Paper Tablet is slightly thicker than a usual Moleskine, but features NCode technology embedded in every page to allow the Pen+ to pick up your writing or drawing.
All in all, the device works well - once you're registered on the app, using the Pen+ is smooth, and the data transfer is effective, even if like us, you aren't particularly artistically-minded. But whilst this is clearly a clever product (and at £199, a premium one too...) there remains a slight nagging question about what it's trying to achieve.
Those of us used to writing with a pen and pad will find some advantages, most notably the chance to edit and remove notes, but with tablet devices and lightweight laptops so commonplace today, it still seems like an odd choice of platform for Moleskine.
The idea behind the F3 is a simple one: provide with a stand that simplifies and organises a desk while maintaining a clean, functional style, without an expensive price tag.
Satechi achieves it with this product which packs some interesting features on top. It has two, rather than one, preset height options thanks to a pair of sturdy aluminium legs with rubber pads.
Physically, it is a fairly big slap of plastic (550 x 231mm) available either in white or anthracite. Plastic usually infers flimsiness but there wasn’t any in sight. This is proper solid stuff. The aluminium legs slot in within seconds after the shorter, permanent ones are deployed.
There’s plenty of connectivity as well; four front facing USB 3.0 ports plus headphone/microphone ports with long cables to connect to your PC or laptop.
It doesn’t require power as the ports are essentially passive ones. The F3 took the weight of a 27-inch monitor without flinching and there are reports of customers using it with a 34-inch behemoth.
You will be able to put items weighing up to 11Kg on top. There’s enough clearance (about 30mm) underneath the actual plastic stand to slot in a keyboard.
Adding the aluminium feet adds another 50mm. A few more USB ports or a smartphone stand might have been useful together with a couple of extra height options. There’s also the fact that a more premium material like glass or aluminium might have been a better, albeit more expensive, option.
A few vendors (Acer, Lenovo) have tried to deliver laptops with dual displays but these proved to be niche products with high prices and they were commercial failures.
Enter PackedPixels (£149 each, about $194, AU$252), a deceptively straightforward product from Dovetail Technology that brings multiple displays to laptops with one big caveat.
Your laptop will need to be equipped with a DisplayPort or Thunderbolt 1 or 2 ports. Newer Thunderbolt 3 ports won't work even with an adaptor, and obviously older ones like HDMI, DVI or VGA are out of the picture.
Note that you can use a USB 3.0 to DisplayPort converter according to the manufacturer. That is what you will have to do on non-Apple laptops.
If you have a DP or a TB1/2 port (Dell XPS 13 first generation, MacBook Pro etc) then using the bundled universal adaptor, you will be able to connect either one or two displays, each of them 9.7-inch in size and with a resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels.
That's a 4:3 aspect ratio, something that works well in cramped spaces and is actually the same screen as the iPad Retina Display.
The designers made the right decision to hide the connecting ports (DisplayPort and USB) where the stand is supposed to slot.
Bear in mind that using two extra screens will eat up your battery faster, although, as Dovetail technologies suggests, you might also use a mobile phone adapter or an emergency power bank (like the Aukey 30Ah) to help out.
Given the connector, you won't need any additional driver installation for any operating system. The screens are automatically adjustable and can be used in portrait or landscape mode.
Jackery is a little known company that focuses - like so many out there - on producing portable laptop and smartphone chargers. Its flagship product is the massive PowerPro, a 500Whr/140Ah Portable Power station rechargeable battery pack, The Jackery Titan S is a portable battery (72.4Whr) that can not only charge your mobile or tablet but also, according to its manufacturer, the popular Apple MacBook laptop.
We didn’t have one at hand to test that claim sadly; note that it is also available in orange which for some reason has a lower capacity. Its black metal aluminium casing ensures that it will survive more than a few drops and it does feel very solid. Shame though about the sharper-than-usual edges on both sides and we’re not fans of the curvy profile of the Titan S as this caused it to slip a few times.
This is a portable charger/battery pack so don’t expect too much innovation; it doesn’t switch off automatically but does identify the connected device by itself, charging it at the maximum permitted power.
Other than a big power button and a 4-led battery status indicators which means you will never really know when the item will be fully charged when you reach four blue dots or discharged when it shows one blue dot.
There are two full size USB ports - a 15W one (5V, 3A) and an 18W one (supporting variable voltages thanks to Quick Charge, up to 3.4A) - and a USB Type-C one that can deliver 15W power (5V, 3A); the latter can also be used to charge the battery.
At 155 x 80 x 22mm for a weight of 435g, it is a tad smaller (volume wise) and lighter than the Aukey Powerbank although the latter has a far superior capacity (30Ah compared to 20.1Ah). The Jackery Titan comes with a micro USB charging cable and a two-year warranty but no carry case. The item is out of stock in the UK at the time of writing.
This printer is not for everyone. It is slow, expensive to buy and to maintain, and it is not even wireless! But then not all printers can list on their spec sheet that they're the world's lightest all-in-one printer, one that can not only print (obviously) but also scan and copy.
The Primera Trio uses only a normal microUSB cable to charge and to connect to the host computer, and unlike most of the competition, it is truly portable (as in it has a battery inside) and boasts a smaller footprint than most laptops.
Outside of this nifty gadget, you'll be hard pressed to find a compact device that you can take with you to print important documents that need immediate signatures (or at least draft copy). The scanning capability is not a big deal – you can always take pictures instead – although with the Trio, you will be able to do copies fairly easily.
Home working can often be a battle for space within a fairly cramped environment, so wireless accessories have become more and more popular in the past few years.
The Gyration Air Mouse Voice looks to take wireless mouse technology one step further, offering flexible use cases from the desk to the boardroom and beyond thanks to the power of voice.
The device, which costs $99, is able to act as a typical desktop mouse, connecting via Bluetooth, but thanks to in-built microphones, can also double up as an in-air meeting pointer, where it can work with voice recognition to skip through slides.
The voice commands can also be used to zoom in on specific details in a slide, and even open up your web browser - all activated just with a push of a button.
Asides from the voice control, the device can also be used as an in-air mouse, allowing to to navigate around a companion PC or laptop whilst in use, which could be super handy for launching new documents or finding specific details.
Set-up is quick and easy, with no special drivers needed, and each of the three device buttons able to be programmed to specific commands via a desktop app. The Air Mouse voice has a wireless range of 70 metres, meaning it’s ideal for both the boardroom and the conference hall, and works with both Windows and OSX software.
The mouse itself may not feel particularly premium, with a rather fragile-looking plastic finish, but if you need to give presentations on a regular basis, this could be an ideal product to take your work to the next level.
Your daily meetings might be about to get even more interactive thanks to the GoTouch pen from Anyractive.
Comprised of a wireless pen and camera unit, the device is in theory able to turn any wall, table or even floor into a display that can be written on. The GoTouch works by connecting to a smartphone or Windows PC connected to an external display, which is then broadcast to your surface of choice.
Unfortunately setting up the device is quite fiddly, requiring a separate app download before you can start projecting. Linking to your Android or iOS device is then done by Bluetooth, which is rather spotty, and means connecting your display and smartphone to the app, which can take some time - not ideal if you quickly need to start a presentation.
Once we did get the GoTouch operational, the pen was largely successful when writing, but did cut out several times. As a pocket-sized projector, however, the GoTouch camera was rather more successful.
Battery life was good, with the camera staying operational for several hours of broadcast, and recharging speedily via USB, however the pen is powered by physical batteries, meaning it might need keeping an eye on in case of embarrassing power failures during a presentation.
Ordering the GoTouch may also be a bit tricky unless you are fluent in Korean, with the company’s online store not offering an English-language version just yet. This also means we have no idea how much it actually costs, as although Anyractive’s Kickstarter page (which says the GoTouch costs $89) smashed its initial $300,000 target, the device is yet to start shipping.
Overall, the GoTouch is a great idea, but one let down hugely by setup problems.
Monoprice's latest 27in monitor looks to offer a premium display without the high price, and for the most part, it succeeds.
The Monoprice 18545 comes with a 27in LED backlit IPS display sporting a 16:9 2560x1440 maximum resolution - equating to 1440p. This does mean it isn't 4K-equipped, however our tests showed the display to perform well with HD video content as well as regular day-to-day use.
The device comes with 178° viewing angles and the company's Pixel Perfect guarantee, which promotes the wide range of colours. Thanks to a flexible rear hinge, the device can also be angled for your viewing preference, with a tilt range from +15 to -5 degrees, which can be useful if you sit near a window.
The monitor comes with an incredibly slim build which is just 2.1in thick, meaning that the screen should easily fit into most workplace desktop environments - and the metal base is pleasingly solid, meaning you shouldn't be able to accidentally knock it over.
The polished grey metal design of the Monoprice 18545 should help blend in to your home or office, but be warned though, the corners of the aluminium build can be remarkably sharp if you catch it unexpectedly. The rear of the display was also quick to warm up quite alarmingly on several occasions, although this did not appear to impact performance.
Given that it isn't 4K-ready, the $279 price tag for the Monoprice 18545 is certainly reasonable, however if you are looking for a truly top-of-the-range offering, it might be worth spending a little more money elsewhere.
With data security becoming paramount for many of us these days, the diskAshur Pro looks to offer a comprehensive security offering to ensure your important data stays intact.
The key selling point of the diskAshur Pro is its obvious physical security - the device comes with a keypad that will only grant access to the data stored within upon entering a PIN number. Far from your usual ATM PIN number though, the device requires an identifier between seven and 15 digits, offering far tougher security, with the number able to be quickly personalised and changed, in order to keep your data safe.
Asides from the physical security (which extends to IP56 water and dust resistance and even a self-destruct feature), the diskAshur Pro also comes with some enviable encryption, sporting XTS-AES 256-bit real-time full disk hardware encryption and EDGE technology to offer even more levels of safety.
This version of the drive offers 500GB of storage, which should easily be enough to store all your vital documents, media and more, and connects to your PC or laptop via a standard USB 3.1 port.
The diskAshur Pro works across all major operating systems, including Windows, Mac, Android, iOS and Linux, and requires no extra additional software to be installed, meaning using the device is incredibly easy.
Getting hold of the product may be the main issue with the diskAshur Pro, with the company manufacturing and selling many other models of the device on its site. We found this particular model for sale on Amazon for £211.96, and on iStorage's own site for £209.
If you are able to get one, however, the diskAshur Pro is unparalleled in both its physical and internal protection, and the compact build and hard-wearing design make this a must-have for the security-conscious.
The Apricorn Aegis Secure Key cuts a familiar figure; it does look a lot like the iStorage one but has 60x more capacity while costing about five times more. Comparing it to other secure USB drives, it does come across as being a bit of a bargain if you want to store massive amounts of data although it costs around three times the cheapest 512GB USB drive.
The USB drive itself incorporates a full 10-key alphanumeric keypad with two function keys plus three status lights. It then slots into a hardened epoxy-potted rugged aluminum enclosure which makes it dust and waterproof; the device is also certified IP-58 and at 46g and 93mm long is fairly chunky, putting a bigger strain on a device’s USB port than most USB drives.
As expected, it comes with built-in hardware encryption (256-bit AES) which means that it is totally independent from the host client and OS-agnostic. No keyloggers and no BadUSB vulnerability. It can be used where no keyboards are present and doesn’t require any drivers or software. It also means that it is powered by a battery which, unfortunately, adds another potential point of failure, especially as it runs rather hot in use.
The Aegis Secure Key has also received a FIPS 140-2 level 3 accreditation from NIST, the US-based National Institute of Standards and Technology, which oversees US government IT and computer security. Setting the drive up is the hardest part of the process. There is no factory default PIN so you need to create your own PIN (at last 7 numbers up to 16) to use it.
The drive can be configured with an admin PIN and a user PIN, both of which are independent and is a particularly useful option in a corporate setup when multiple units are deployed.
The presence of an on-device keyboard makes brute-force attempts difficult and after 20 incorrect PIN entry attempts, the drive automatically deletes the encryption key, rendering the data unreadable. What’s more, it auto-locks when it is disconnected from the host PC or after a set period. Note that it may not work with a USB-hub because of higher power requirements.
There is also a read-only mode that prevents the user from tampering with data on the drive. Add in a rated data transfer rate of up to 190MBps/160MBps (read/write speeds) and a three-year warranty and you get a very solid product. As always, bear in mind that such a device – especially of this size- doesn’t remove the need to have a secure backup; drives – even those with high MTBF - do fail, get damaged or lost.
There are plenty of storage solutions on the market that promise to secure your content using good old physical PIN numbers and the Datashur Pro (£68.42 from Amazon, which is about $89, AU$116) is one of them. The difference here is that the numeric keypad is on the drive which eradicates the threat of traditional keyloggers.
This USB 3.0 drive is IP57-rated which means that it is dust protected and can be immersed in up to 1m of water. That is as long as it's housed in its rugged extruded aluminium sleeve. You can laser etch text or a logo on the device for an additional fee, with capacities ranging from 8GB to 64GB.
The drive has a rechargeable battery that allows the user to enter a PIN (between 7 and 15 digits long, and you have 10 seconds to do that) before connecting the drive to a USB port; the battery obviously gets charged when you plug it into said port.
The data transferred to the USB drive is encrypted in real-time thanks to the built-in XTS-AES 256-bit hardware encryption – which doesn't slow down your system – and adheres to MIL-STD-810F, FIPS 140-2 Level3, CESG CPA/NLNCSA and FIPS PUB 197 standards.
You don't require any additional drivers, and the drive itself is compatible with almost all operating systems under the sun – that includes Linux, Chrome and exotic affairs running on thin clients and embedded systems (e.g. Citrix).
The list goes on, though: smartphones, tablets, printers, scanners, CCTV cameras, basically any device with a USB or USB OTG port. Bear in mind that if the host device is compromised, then your data and your drive won't be secure.
Just remember that while this is a secure device, you should still have backups because if you forget your PIN, the stick will delete the encryption key after 10 failed attempts.
All the drives come with a three-year warranty although the very nature of the product means that aftersales service might be tricky. If your drive failed with data on it, do you take the risk and send it back or just dump it?
Perhaps the only reservation we have, other than the price, has to do with the design: the length of this device – about 78mm – means that it's more likely that you could damage your laptop USB port if there's an unfortunate knock on the stick.
As for performance, it reached 126MBps in read and 43MBps in write speeds respectively on CrystalDiskMark benchmark, roughly in line with what iStorage suggested.
Plug in the Kingston Ironkey D300 (IKD300/8GB) in your computer and the first thing you will notice is that the drive shows up as a CD Drive with a 14.4MB capacity. Surely some mistake! Well, you actually need to initialise the drive before using it for the first on any computer.
Note that Kingston strongly advises not to use the drive via a USB hub. Launching the application will request that you create a password (between eight and 16 characters) and will go on to format the drive.
You will confusingly end up with two “drives”, one with the initialisation software and the other one being the actual empty drive. Insert it in another computer (Linux, Mac or Windows) and you will be prompted to enter the right password.
Otherwise, as for other similar solutions on the market, enter the password wrong 10 times in a row and your content will be erased. As for the drive itself, it is an 8GB model with a zinc casing – which also doubles as a heatsink as the D300 heats up a fair bit under use - and tamper-evident epoxy seal for physical security.
With its cap on, it is waterproof (up to 4ft) and dustproof and at 51g, feels solid. More importantly though, the more compelling protection happens inside the device itself. It is a FIPS 140-2 Level 3 certified device with 256-bit AES hardware encryption.
There is a hardware cryptographic module inside the device itself which means that the encryption and decryption is done on the drive rather than on the host PC, with digitally signed firmware which makes the D300 immune to the notorious BadUSB exploit.
The D300, which comes with a five-year warranty, also offers a read-only option which allows any user, once authenticated, to open and view content on the drive but not change, update or erase the content.
There’s also a managed version of the drive which, as its name implies, allows the drive to be deployed en masse across an organisation but requires Ironkey EMS by Datalocker which allows for the drives to be centrally managed. This allows for drive-specific policies and allows administrators to disable lost or stolen drives remotely and more.
The drives are available in capacities ranging from 4GB to 128GB. The rated transfer rates of the drive vary between 80MBps to 250MBps (read) and 12MBps to 85MBps (write) depending on the capacity. Rule of thumb is the lower the capacity, the slower it will be.
The 8GB model performed better than expected with CrystalDiskMark benchmark results hitting 237.6MBps and 58.69MBps on Read and Write respectively.
The trend for thinner, lighter and more aesthetically pleasing laptop designs gave us the Apple Macbook, a stunningly beautiful device with only one connector, a lonely USB Type-C port.
There's a plethora of accessories - adapters and docking stations - on the market to solve that problem though, especially as more and more laptops are following Apple's lead and cutting the number of connectors to a minimum.
The Satechi Slim Aluminum Type-C Multi-Port Adapter is one of them. Available in four Apple-friendly colours, this device quadruples the amount of ports of the aforementioned MacBook.
There's a pass-through USB Type-C as well as two USB Type-A ports and an HDMI connector capable of supporting 4K video content, albeit at 30Hz - we'd certainly have preferred a DisplayPort.
Physically, the device is about 105mm long and comes with a 150mm USB Type-C cable. The enclosure is made entirely of aluminium which has a propensity to get scratched and marked when flung around too often.Compared to other products on the market, having a cable is preferable to avoid accidental damage to your laptop's port.
Note that each USB port on the Slim Type-C hub can provide 5V/1A (or 5W) and that Satechi advises that the maximum power load on the hub shouldn't exceed 10W, which excludes using it for heavy duty activities (e.g. charging two tablets).
The product comes with a one-year warranty.
Sandberg's Powerbank is neither the cheapest or the most powerful around. However, it does come with a couple of features that make it a rather enticing option.
It outputs to a number of voltages (12V, 16V, 19V and 20V), automatically choosing the right one depending on the device connected to it.
There are also two USB ports and these are obviously hardwired to output 5V on both. There are also 12 different charge tips but none would fit my Dell XPS 13, and they won't be useful for USB Type-C models like the Dell XPS 13 2016 edition.
There are a couple of things that differentiate this from most of its rivals on the market: it uses a brushed, premium, aluminium finish, with bright blue LED status lights that clearly indicate the amount of juice left or how close the battery is to being charged.
Speaking of charging, Sandberg decided to equip the Powerbank with a dedicated input port which allows the device to be charged in record time thanks to a 36W (18V/2A) power supply unit.
In comparison, the Aukey 30Ah we reviewed recently could only be charged using a 12W USB port which makes charging a lengthy process, often an overnight affair. It also means that you don't rely on your laptop or mobile charger to get the battery replenished.
Sandberg has equipped the Powerbank with an automatic 'switch on and switch off' mechanism to save power. It can deliver up to a total of 85W meaning that it can accommodate a massive 70W on its laptop/DC Out port. Note that the device comes with an industry-leading five-year warranty.
Quite a lot of Ultrabooks (and even a fair few graphics cards) now come with Mini DisplayPort connection as standard in lieu of the traditional D-Sub or HDMI ports; which can prove to be a pain if you're planning to deliver a presentation at a client's office and they only have a HDMI projector.
In theory, Mini DisplayPort – which is popular with Apple - has enough bandwidth to drive 4K monitors at 60Hz (HDMI can only do it at 30Hz) which results in a smoother end-user experience. However, today's product doesn't achieve this (it does reach 4K at 30Hz though).
What it does is merely converting the Mini DisplayPort to a HDMI port, all for just over £23 (about $35, AU$45), more specifically from DP m1.2 to HDMI 1.4 without the need for drivers or external power source.
Unlike other passive video adaptors, this one offers active signal conversion which means that it doesn't require a multi-mode DisplayPort source signal (like AMD's Eyefinity) which greatly expands its compatibility option. In addition, mDP supports 5.1 Surround Sound out of the box and is compatible with most Intel Thunderbolt devices. You will still need to have a HDMI cable at the other end though.
From a distance, it looks like a standard USB cable with a microUSB connector on one end and a bigger-than-average one on the other.
But look closer and you will see that it is a mirroring and KM (keyboard and mouse) sharing accessory. The KMC6105 allows you to view and interact with your Android device regardless of the brand and platform (i.e. tablet, Chromecast, smartphone) as well as sharing your keyboard and mouse.
Perhaps more importantly, it charges your Android device while in use, something that the previous generation model did not offer. Unlike that one, it allows you to use your smartphone as an additional screen. It also offers copy/cut and paste as well as drag and drop across the platform.
You will need to install a small executable file that is located on the device itself. Otherwise it will only behave like a standard (expensive) cable. You will need to enable Developer Options in newer smartphones by clicking seven times on the "build number" menu.
Subsequently, you will need to allow USB debugging which is how the KMC6105 works its magic. The installation process will also download the device's driver where necessary. Note that the device carries a standard two-year warranty and is USB 2.0 only.
The Android OS Mirroring and KM sharing cable is on sale at Lindy for £24.96.
Audio has historically never been a forte for laptops and that hasn't changed for Ultrabooks especially for those at the lower end of the spectrum (one might even say that it became worse).
Which is why something like an external sound card comes in quite handy. USB devices in general usually carry a performance penalty mostly because they use the host's processing power.
They also have a small impact on the battery life. However, given how powerful the recent crop of Intel-based processors has been, that shouldn't be an issue.
The ICUSBAUDIOMH External USB Card lets you add an S/PDIF digital audio output or a standard 3.5mm analog audio connection to your system through USB and essentially adds a 5.1 sound card.
The device, which is about the size of a lighter, has two 3.5-inch jacks for headphone and microphone (some Ultrabooks like the Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro only have one port).
Startech's external card comes at the end of a rather long USB cable, uses a Via VT1630A chipset and is capable of sampling audio at up to 96kHz.
Available in black or white, it does support Sony's PlayStation 3 gaming console and comes with a two-year warranty.
This USB Stereo Audio Adapter External Sound Card is available for sale at Startech.
Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2 may be renamed Pro when it launches next month
Sony took to CES 2018 to reveal three new phones - including the Xperia XA2 - but the rumors are already beginning for next month's MWC 2018 where Sony is rumored to introduce a new phone with a 4K screen.
Sony has released two 4K panel-toting phones in the past - 2015's Xperia Z5 Premium and last year's Xperia XZ Premium - and the new phone will once again sit at the top of the company's wide spreading phone range.
The latest rumor suggests Sony will instead switch the name of the top line phones though - it's rumored to be called the Xperia XZ Pro.
Chinese website MyDrivers has published a screenshot of a leaked document referring to the new phone as the Xperia XZ Pro for the first time.
Pro or Premium?Despite not being noted on the page supplied by MyDrivers, the website is still confident the document confirms the Xperia XZ Pro will have a 5.7-inch, 4K resolution display.
The spec in the screenshot suggests it'll have a top of the range Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor, 6GB of RAM, 128GB of internal storage and 256GB microSD support.
Predictably the phone will be running the latest Android 8 Oreo software and will have IP68 protection to ensure the phone is water resistant. The phone also has a 3,420mAh battery.
Rumors for the phone's camera are few and far between at the moment, so we'll keep an eye out for further news on what may be on the rear of the phone.
Take all of this with a big pinch of salt though, we can't confirm the screenshot's details are all correct as we don't know the source. That said, it does make sense that Sony will reveal new phones at MWC, so expect to see something from the company at the tailend of February.
Sony Xperia XZ Premium 2: everything we know so farVia Phone Arena
The best Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL deals in January 2018
Google's quest to build a smartphone as popular as the latest iPhone and Samsung Galaxy took a massive step forward when the original Google Pixel launched last year. Its successor - the aptly named Google Pixel 2 - is now on the shelves. And it's just seen a MASSIVE price drop, meaning you can now get a Pixel 2 deal for less than £20 per month!
The Pixel 2 is a phone for Android lovers who want the purist interface on the market - even if it does only look like an incremental update from the original Pixel. But it's substantially more affordable than the likes of the Galaxy Note 8 and iPhone X, making it an obvious choice if you want a brand new flagship phone without paying stupid money.
And then there's the supersized Pixel 2 XL as well, with its fantastic 6-inch QHD+ display. Read on to see exactly how much you'll have to pay for your choice of new Google phone with our Pixel deals comparison chart.
Need some more convincing? Our exclusive 10OFF voucher code with Mobiles.co.uk knocks a tenner off the upfront cost of any deal. And there's a summary of our expert review at the bottom of the page.
More options: Samsung Galaxy S8 deals | Samsung Galaxy Note 8 deals | iPhone 8 deals | Google Pixel and Pixel XL deals | SIM only deals | Best mobile phone deals
The best Google Pixel 2 deals in the UK today:We've scoured the UK's networks and retailers to home in on the best Pixel 2 deals. You can get the new Google smartphone on O2, Vodafone or EE - the choice is yours...
Want that bigger QHD+ screen? Go for the Pixel 2 XL instead if you plan to use your phone to stream films and TV. But you'd better be prepared to pay for the privilege - the price really shoots up, as there are fewer retailers competing on price.
When the Pixel 2 hit the market, we were urging people to buy the handset outright and combine it with a cheap SIM only deal. The Pixel 2 costs £629 and the Pixel 2 XL will be £799 to buy SIM-free and adding in a SIM plan for a fiver a month made financial sense. But now that contract plans have shot down in price, they are now the more cost-effective way to go.
There's no doubt that the Pixel 2 is one of the very finest Android phones out there, but the Pixel's successor is a familiar story of incremental improvements rather than whole-scale change. The feature that might just get you buying are the top-of the-line cameras for photos and video. While the delightful screen, great-sounding speakers and slick Android operating system will all appeal to a range of smartphone users.
Read TechRadar's full Google Pixel 2 review
Read TechRadar's full Google Pixel 2 XL review
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